Wish I was an Edwardian baebe

If only I could spend my time alternating between lying/flouncing around in lacy tea dresses, lawn dresses, and other drippy, cream colored garments, but being alive in the modern world is a dirty business, and it simply isn't practical. Me, crawling out of my car in a long skirt with a 24" circumference. Me, getting caught in doors by my sleeves, or waving the cat away as she tries to bat at them. Me, frantically dabbing coffee out of a 96 year old bodice - it's just not viable.

Unfortunate.

This fashion era, although admittedly awkward at times, is one of my very favorites, if not my main favorite. No other bygone period of fashion is as charming or flattering. Victorian wasp waists are a little disgusting, and bustles look grotesque. Remember the two nasty sisters from Disney's Cinderella? And the reality of so many layers and sleeves to your wrists is less romantic than is typically imagined. Have you ever tried on or seen a 19th century dress in person? Two words: sweat stains.

Another eminent fashion favorite is the 1920s in which everyone envisions some boyish model in a fringey dress. The reality? Shapeless dresses that double as potato sacks, drop waists, rolled stockings! Rolled stockings. Also, cloche hats look like shit on me.

Yeah, Edwardian fashion (the Romanovs, the Titanic, Julia Ormond in Legends of the Fall for those who don't view history as a chronology of dresses) is the best. Modernized but pretty and romantic. Less bullshit than prior periods, fewer skirts, no corset, enough lace to keep French maiden aunts busy for a century, and the jewelry is refined and classical - no jet or reliquaries and other heavy shit if you are not into that.

Oh and if you like to swim (I don't - auction's all yours): About as modest as you can get with your knees exposed.

She likes to be threaded

I watched Belle du Jour for the first time recently. Oh my godddd Pierre Clementi. He's uncouth and brash and arrogant, whip thin, rude, and carrying a long cane, all of which works to neutralize (or complement, I dont know) the high cheekbones and girlish face. Like I said somewhere else on the internet, it's all fucked up gold teeth and little waistcoats from here on out.

Catherine Deneuve is so fronsh. I first saw her in The Hunger, which I love very much, and on a sidenote I think she was looking better in the 80s than she did in the 60s. Her character's style had an effect on me, and I filed it away for later consideration as I age. I don't think any twentysomething can pull off her offhandedly sophisticated Eurocentric sexiness, all orderly chignons and sheer stockings (cmon, it was the 80s) and little suits with YSL scarves. Interestingly, YSL dressed Deneuve for every scene in Belle du Jour and it shows. Maybe the best part about her in the movie, in my opinion. Here they are together.