Everyone's seen this guy's dresses, right? I mean, they're in each fashmag each month, on radically different people (okay, radically different in the fashmag world, which means models AND actresses AND socialites AND random people employed in the fashion industry). So you've probably seen them. What I don't know is if your eye is caught by them the way mine is. Obviously the large, clashing patterns push my buttons, along with the higher waistline and fullish, knee-length skirt.

In fact, you already that I really like this style, because I posted about a very similar vintage one a few months ago.

I wish one of the big five pattern companies would come up with a knockoff of this, or better yet, hire him to do a pattern with his name on it. This would be easy to sew, and it's very easy to wear. (I know it might make bigger-busted women look pregnant, but I think the fear of looking pregnant is overcomeable. Or ought to be. Really, what does it matter if someone thinks you're in the early stages of pregnancy? It's not like being a leper, and as far as I can tell, nearly everyone who is pregnant looks better pregnant than not. I know I did. So perhaps it should be taken as a compliment. "You look great today! Are you pregnant?")

If I made myself one, I would (of course) do it in two clashing Liberty Varuna wools, and wear it all winter long. Peacock-feather wool for the body and a geometric print for the bands. I'd narrow the sleeves a bit (I hate to have my sleeves trailing in the butter), as well as narrowing the shoulders and armholes, and widen the waistband. And, of course, I'd add pockets.

Click on the image if you want to know what the real thing costs, and where you can buy it.

I was at the library yesterday and pillaged the GT section, so there will be more gems such as this to come:

Ladies attending Their Majesties' Courts will appear in Full Dress, with TRAINS and PLUMES. For Half Mourning Black and White, White, Mauve, or Grey should be worn.

FEATHERS should be worn so that they can be clearly seen on approaching the Presence, with White veils or lappets. Coloured feathers are inadmissible, but in deep mourning Black feathers may be worn.

WHITE GLOVES only are to be worn, excepting in the case of mourning, when Black or Grey gloves are admissible.

HIGH COURT DRESS.–The King has been pleased to permit that a High Court Dress, according to the following description, may be worn in future at Their Majesties' Courts, and on other State occasions, by Ladies, to whom, from illness, infirmity, or advancing age, the present low Court Dress is inappropriate, viz., Bodices in front, cut square or heart shape, which may be filled in with white only, either transparent or lined; at the back, high, or cut down three-quarter height. Sleeves to elbow, either thick or transparent. Trains, gloves, and feathers as usual.

It is necessary for Ladies who wish to appear in "HIGH COURT DRESS," to have obtained permission through the Lord Chamberlain, unless they have already received it.

Which is quite a long-winded way of saying "no shirt no shoes no service," huh?

This is from Dress Worn At His Majesty's Court, edited by Herbert A. P. Trendell. Issued with the authority of the Lord Chamberlain. 1908. The endpapers are covered with ads for military tailors and cigarettes, and the part above is one of only two pages with instructions for women. The rest is about appropriate dress (mostly uniforms) for men at court.

If you want to see what this looked like, try this link: Mrs. George McLaughlin in Court Dress for Presentation at Buckingham Palace.

Sir Alfred: … I happen to want to celebrate. I want to be seen in your exquisite company. I want the whole world to know that I am the most fortunate of men in the possession of the most magnificent of wives. I want to swim in champagne–and paint the whole town not only red but red, white, and blue! (going toward her) I want everybody to see how much I adore you (taking her by the shoulders and looking at her)–always have adored you, revere you, and trust you. Also how much I hope you have of warmth for me. …

Daphne: But my darling, I worship you.

Sir Alfred: Then put on your most outrageous dress!

Daphne: Shall I wear the purple, with the plumes at the hips?

Sir Alfred: By all means. And let it be a purple lesson to me.

from Unfaithfully Yours.

And of course "too much" here can mean either that I currently possess too much fabric (true) or that this fabric, right here, is too much (also probably true).

This is some Liberty lawn going cheap (so far …) on Ebay. I'm not buying it (see me not buying it? See me reluctantly not buying it?) mostly because I have about seven or eight yards of Liberty en route to me from the UK already and I think if I buy any more there will be a nice man from MI5 showing up at my door with a couple of spiffy gadgets, enquiring gently what one person could actually DO with all this fabric, and wouldn't I like to let him know what my plans for geopolitical domination are, so he can scotch them? (Then, of course, we will have sex, shortly followed by explosions of a different kind. And a car chase. All of which would cut way into my sewing time, so I better cool it.)

I'm also not buying it because it's a bit short, and I've made a vow not to buy any more fabric if I can't get at least three yards of 54" wide, or five yards of anything else. I'm tired of wasting time laying out patterns to find that my fabric is half a yard short. I need that time to actually SEW, dammit, so now, it's five yards or nothing. I don't care how pretty it is. I keep saying "Oh, I'll make a blouse," but I don't really wear blouses. I wear dresses, and I wear t-shirts, and I wear sweaters. I don't wear blouses. I have four blouses half-made and abandoned in my sewing room right this very minute. I have a dozen ready-made blouses hanging in my closet, one or two of which have never been worn. (Sheer black chiffon? What was I thinking? I don't care if it does have a peter-pan collar! I blame H&M Disease, that feverish excitement that comes over you when you're there and leads you to buy unsuitable clothes, thinking that you will magically become the kind of person who wears them. Some people have the household equivalent, Ikea Syndrome, where they feel buying a container with a funny name will magically make them organized.)

Anyway, if you make blouses, or very narrow skirts, this is one heck of a print. I wish I knew the name of it as I will be looking out for more … about three yards more.

I don't know why I always start looking around at party dresses after Halloween. It's not really as if I am the belle of the galas, and I already have enough fancy dresses to meet Brooke Astor's schedule. However, if YOU need fancy dresses for holiday parties, you might want to start with this one. First of all, it's only $42! (A Buy It Now on eBay.)

It's in great condition and a good small-modern size: B34/W29/H38. And I love the unexpected yellow and brown print … I am so bored with black holiday party dresses. I know, I know, it's slimming, and it's wearable party after party, but that's because nobody remembers it. "Oh, remember the woman in the black dress?" "Which one?" Now, "Remember the woman in that yellow dress?" "Oh, sure …" If you buy middle-level vintage, you can have three or four nice party dresses, one-of-a-kind party dresses, for the price of one midrange new party dress. And the vintage will have better design and better fabric and if you spill red wine on it, well, you have two more in the closet!

Wear this one with brown satin shoes and a brown satin clutch and a necklace of big vulgar barbaric yellow CZs, if you can find one.

I'm going to hold off on this pattern and hope for it to show up in the next size up, even though I think it's pure genius and I could certainly go up from a B34 to a B36.

It's from FuzzyLizzie's Vintage Patterns, and even if you aren't a fan of Halston, go there right now. Seriously. She has tons of Mary Quant! She has older Dior! She has Betsey Johnson! And all at very, very reasonable prices (under $20, for the most part). There's a 50s dress in particular with a scalloped detail that goes across the front and *over onto the back shoulder* that I think is worth three times what's she's charging.

Anyway, back to Mr. Halston. In a weak moment (aren't they all?) I bought some bright magenta knit fabric that just screams for a minimally-seamed 1970's dress to set it off (although how I'd do the facings that must be required for this neckline in knit I'm not sure … maybe it's self-lined? That would work …). I think this one would be excellent. You can control the plunge of the neckline and the length of the skirt and there are no goddamn Bishop sleeves to deal with. (I hate Bishop sleeves, what a lot of trouble for something so unpleasant to wear and look at!)

The only thing I don't like about this dress is that there are no side seams, so there is nowhere to put a pocket unless I put it in the underbust seam, and if I'm going to put a pocket there I might as well carry money around in my bra. And the knit I'm thinking about won't support a patch pocket (which would also ruin the line of the dress). Ah, well, on to the next candidate.

Isn't this a cute dress from Revamp Vintage? Thank La Bella Donna for pointing us all toward their site.

This dress, from their 1930s collection, is really adorable, and I say this as an avowed opponent of puff sleeves. Not that I haven't worn them myself, it's just I always regret it later, much like eating Cool Ranch Doritos.

Anyway, it's $150, they make them in limited runs, click on the picture, blah blah blah.

Now for the rant, which the Revamp site reminded me of. Revamp, helpfully, has sections on vintage makeup and hairstyles, so you can get the complete look. I have nothing against the complete look, but I personally prefer to wear my vintage in a completely ahistorical manner. (Not to mention that achieving a totally vintage look is HARD.)

In addition to the 'how-to-do-you-get-a-finger-wave" stuff, Revamp also provides little histories of each era for which they make clothes, thumbnail overviews, really, just in case someone can't quite remember when WWII was. From their 1950s overview: "Certainly some women [giving up work outside the home after the war] were reluctant to give up their newly found sense of independence, but many women were happy to take up their traditional roles again. … The main image for women was of demure femininity suitable for the sober role of motherhood." Now, there are certain arguments that can be made about how the role of homemaker and full-time mother was one that was not really possible for any but a very limited class of women before the 1950s, and, of course, whenever you see the word "many," the natural reaction is to say "HOW many, and how do you know?" But it's (I remind myself) just a quick sketch of a complicated era, put up to sell clothes.

All that aside, I get tremendously irked (here's the rant coming, fair warning) when someone thinks that just because I'm wearing a 1950s dress, I have 1950s thoughts, and espouse the values that are (usually erroneously) attributed to that era. Anyway, excuse my language, but fuck that noise.

I wear 1950s styles for aesthetic reasons, not ideological ones. I just like the way they look. I don't think that a full skirt correlates at all with a desire for women not to work outside the home, for instance. Or that my fondness for little cardigan sweaters, with or without pearls, should be taken as an indication that I disapprove of premarital sex, or that a Peter Pan collar signals "Hey, love those Jim Crow laws!" I know that some people wear vintage as part of a greater push toward recapturing what they consider to be some golden age, but, really, the past mostly sucked. So I don't really understand idealizing that time, no matter how aesthetically pleasing the clothes and cars were.

This correlation of clothes and ideology seems to be tighter for the 1950s, by the way. If you show up in some 1930s silk bias evening gown, nobody assumes that you're pro-Hitler. A cloche hat doesn't signify any opinion, either way, on Prohibition. A 1940s dress isn't read as a silent vote for internment camps. But put on a June Cleaver-ish dress, and all of a sudden you're a sergeant in the June Cleaver Attitude Readjustment & Nostalgia Army.

Thanks but no thanks. I don't want to return to some supposedly more genteel era (all my time-machine fantasies involve me going back, buying out a few department stores after betting on the Kentucky Derby winner, and returning hot-foot to the present day with my trophies). I like it here just fine, thanks, what with the Internet and stay-at-home dads and contraception and cell phones and integration and jetpacks and all. Oh, wait, I forgot that we don't have jetpacks yet. But when we do I'm gonna be wearing a nice full skirt with mine. And possibly pearls.

I suggest you add this eBay seller your favorites list, because … look at this scan! Perfect, high-res, great detail — AND she scans the backs of the patterns so you can see the pattern pieces and the fabric requirements! ::love::

I adore the bodice on this one. Those gathers aren't as hard to sew as you might think, because (next suggestion) you can brute-force the flat piece over the gathers with the topstitching.

I also (and does this even warrant mentioning?) love the pockets. I do not, however, love the skirt, which requires you (in the mode of the times) to have dispensed with such trivial things as hips. (If you are naturally tall and slender, though, instead of shortish and roundish as I am, this is the dress for you!)

If this weren't B32 I would be strongly tempted to buy it and (another suggestion) change the skirt to a more forgiving A-line. In fact, (last few suggestions I promise) think of an A-line skirt with a center gore mirroring the triangle of the bodice … think of that bodice in handkerchief linen … (absolutely, positively last suggestion) click on the image to see the eBay auction — it only has a day or two to run. And it's a Canadian seller, so … cheap!

Isn't this amazing? (Thanks, Mary Beth!) It's not for sale, but click on the image to read the story behind its acquisition and a long train of admiring comments.

It's beaded, so I can't even imagine how much it weighs. Or how many hours it took to make … I think I am content to admire it from afar, instead of wanting to wear it (or even have one) myself. Everything I've ever had that was beaded started shedding beads the moment it crossed my threshold. I evidently have some special bead-loosening power. Don't worry, I only use it for good, not for evil.

I adore that color (as I think I've mentioned before). In fact, today I am wearing not only a teal sweater but teal tights. With an A-line skirt that is a Liberty print of orange dots and red stars. (I am demented, yes, I am. Thanks for noticing.) But somehow it works … at least, I think it works. I'm still waiting on the independent verification team.

Just a quick note for any Oak Park, Illinois peeps — if you are free tonight, I can't imagine why you wouldn't go see Mary Beth Klatt talk about vintage wedding dresses at the Historical Society of Oak Park and River Forest. Details here.

I'd be there but I'm out of town.

This dress is from Isadoras.com and is, sadly, already sold. They have a couple more, though, if orange blossoms are in your future.