A highlight of my day yesterday (although, there were many..) was going to the Musee des Arts Decoratifs, which is actually part of the Louvre, and discovering the most wonderful exhibit of a fashion designer, Madeleine Vionnet. Oh, it was fabulous!!! Shame on me, I had never heard of her… but will now never forget. Here is a link to the page from the museum: it’s in French, but click on the English flag at top to go to the museum’s main link.
The display was wonderful: the rooms all dark except for the dioramas with clothes, then in front of each dress/coat/costume was an image of the original model, circa 1912-1940, wearing the original fashion, and then a precise description of fabric, how it was cut on the bias, or otherwise (she was one of the first to widely use bias cut), how she envisioned the creation to be worn etc. I especially loved the earlier things: the rosettes attached to black silk and crepe evening and day dresses, the layered look, the gauze with touches of gold intertwined. In her later years some of the day coats were wonderful: warm and luscious wool with standing fur collars.
She said that there were three elements to design: the circle, the square, and the straight line: with these, one could design anything. What do you think??
Her favorite fabric, in the end, was crepe: the lightweight texture and the malleability were just what she was after!
Anyway, I got sort of carried away here!
Another of my favorite times was walking in the Tuilleries, always a wonderful experience. Here are a few pictures:
And, for you travel hounds out there: here is the Pompidou Center! I had never seen til yesterday.
That’s it for now. Oh so many things to write about. I’ll post more tomorrow.
