The Peacock Dress, 1902

“The Peacock Dress,” 1902

Designed by House of Worth

Worn by Lady Curzon, Vicereine of India, at the Delhi Durbar which celebrated of the coronation of Edward VII. The gold, silk, and beetle wing fabric was created in India and sent to Paris to be made into the dress by House of Worth.

via National Trust

From design to costume: Emma Watson’s Beauty and the Beast costumes, as designed by Jacqueline Durran ( X ) ( X )

“Those costumes exist in people’s imaginations and all I wanted to do was to honor what they expect those costumes to be in a live action movie”

On the blue village dress: “We decided to take inspiration from the 1991 movie and enrich the world using historical details from 18th century France. (…) Belle has the pockets hanging on the outside of her costume. The pockets act as a sort of toolbelt where she keeps all the things useful to her in her day to day life, those are the two elements we really looked for. The pant-like bloomers are nice, as you can tell, but also again they were part of her being able to be more active, so that you don’t feel restricted by wearing a skirt because you can just pull it up and then just do whatever you were going to do.”

On the yellow ball gown: “Emma was quite categorical that she didn’t want a big princess dress. She wanted to have something she could move in and she definitely, adamantly would not be wearing a corset. The finished product is a lightweight combination of tulle, satin organza and taffeta, made to twirl and look as though it is made by/from the castle. I think in the movie, it’s difficult to see some of the detail, but the idea that Madame Garderobe gets the gold pattern from the ceiling and puts it around the dress, meant that we had to print a gold print on the dress”

The red snow attire: “That costume was made entirely from sustainable fabrics. We dyed it in vegetable dyes in our workroom, we had shoes made with eco leather and we did the whole thing from top to bottom to be as thorough as we could. People learned different skills in the work rooms to be able to do it, so they dyers learned to dye with strange vegetable dye. Sometimes it took two weeks to dye something because you’d have to leave it in there for that long to get a rich color”

http://people.com/movies/beauty-beast-costumes-making-of-details/

Belle’s finale dress from beauty and the beast 2017 doesn’t seem to evoke the 1700s. If you redesign the shape of that dress, what would it be? A robe de cour or a sack back gown or a robe Anglais?

Oh, of course it does not. For the ones who have no idea what this is about, it’s this dress:

Since the occasion seems to be more like a country dance than a proper ball or court, I’d totally avoid a robe de cour (that dress was supposed to be worn at court only, think about it as the ultimate and most formal of all gowns).

Looking that the mood is pretty pastoral I would not use a robe à la française either, it would stand out too much next to the “simpler” dressed other women are wearing. Here I’m totally suspending my incredulity and even ignoring the fact that Dan Stevens’ style is pretty much mid-18th century and the other men are definitely at the last part of the century.

So, I’d change it into a robe à l’anglaise, probably in printed cotton, and i’d keep the neckline, the transparent sleeves (just for the lols), and maybe would play with the sheer fabric for a petticoat under the anglaise gown.

Today I discovered a new type of dress from the 18th century that I didn't know and when I saw it in movies I thought it was pure artistic freedom.

What is a Robe à la Piémontaise?

EXCELLENT QUESTION, MY FRIEND.

Let’s say that if you put in the mixer a robe à la française and a robe a l’anglaise, you get a robe à la piémontaise. It’s like the labradoodle of the 18th century dresses.

Now, where does the name come from? Apparently, according to a 1778 plate that describes this dress (more on that later), this style is first "taken from the theatre of Lyon during the journey of Her Royal Highness Madame Clotilde of France, Princess of Piedmont" in 1775.

This particular dress style was fashionable during the 1770s an 1780s, so most extant ones are simply dated as "late 18th century", which is not wrong (let's also think about those that get into a trend later, and also about dresses having alterations through time).

So, how would we describe a robe à la pièmontaise? Imagine a robe à la française with those spectacular pleats floating on the back, but then separate the pleats from the torso and make it perfectly smooth, then add the pleats only on the neckline. Did that make any kind of sense? Maybe? Anyway, that would look something like this:

It's really the side view that gives the piémontaise away.

Here a description from a 1778 fashion plate: "Robe à la Piémontaise: these gowns have pleats in the back, like the robes à la Française, but these pleats are applied after cutting, like the skirts of a gown, and form a type of cape, which attaches in the back at the top of the collar; this mantua is left to hang.  Sometimes the Ladies cover the body or pull it up under the arms with much grace." Galerie des Modes, 13e Cahier, 6e Figure, 1778.

You can take a look at the plate HERE at Cassidy Percoco's blog (that is definitely worth a follow!)

Anyway, another post is coming with way more images about this dress, and some recreations by some costumers that are jaw dropping.

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Images from top:

- A rare silk strips brocade robe à la Piémontaise, 1770s, Kerry Taylor Auctions.

The Romans admired moonstone, as they believed it was born from solidified rays of the Moon.

The background paintings from Hollow Mind in high quality. The rest are in a reblog. Done by u/FinnMcMissile98, here's the og reddit post:

https://href.li/?https://www.reddit.com/r/TheOwlHouse/comments/ua3zc3/hd_version_of_all_the_paintings/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share