Many apologies for the lateness of this post. It was programmed to be published last Friday as I was fittingly in Dunedin for a wedding, but autopublish failed me! This week’s wedding dress provides the inspiration for Maureen Montgomery’s forthcoming Te Papa lecture on The World of Charles Frederick Worth –Read more
One of my most favourite fashion terms is passementerie. Its a French term that looks and sounds good, and which economically describes a luxurious array of frivolities used to adorn dress and interiors, including pom poms, bobbles, braid, ribbon, fringing, buttons, tassels and gimp. The English equivalent is the equally delightful ‘haberdashery’. Read more
Following the holiday period, Te Papa is getting into full swing for 2012. The lifts are crammed, the phones are ringing, emails are flying and meeting requests are flooding in. Best of all, it also means that the 2012 Events Programme for Unveiled: 200 Years of Wedding Fashion from the Victoria & Albert Museum, London isRead more
This week’s ‘wedding dress of the week’ is an homage to classicism. Designed by Ian & Marcel this dress and coat is one of the most subtle yet rewarding ensembles included in Unveiled: 200 Years of Wedding Fashion from the Victoria & Albert Museum, London. Ian & Marcel was founded in 1979 by twoRead more
This week’s wedding dress is a recent acquisition – one which caused much excitment amongst Te Papa’s History team when it arrived. Wholly romantic in design, this dress is made from a Second World War silk parachute. It was made for Carol Gifford by members of her family, for her marriage toRead more
Wedding dress by Charles James for Baba Beaton, 1934 The Parisian fashion designer Madeleine Vionnet (1876 – 1975) is credited with having invented the bias cut. She commented: ‘Maybe because everyone else made dresses that flowed in the same direction, I saw that if I turned the fabric on an angle… it gained elasticity’.Read more
A Christmas Wedding This silk chiffon and satin dress was worn by Lucy Eleanor (Lulu) Cracroft of Hataitai when she wed James Meade Ferguson at St Mark’s Church in Wellington just after Christmas on 29 December, 1914. While the dress is machine sewn, it features a significant amount of hand detailing and finishing,Read more
Unveiled: 200 Years of Wedding Fashion from the Victoria and Albert Museum, London was officially opened this morning with a special wedding breakfast for 300 guests. Perhaps surprisingly for an exhibition from wintery London, guests were adorned with lei and fresh ‘ei (flower garland) on arrival and were drawn upstairsRead more
On Monday, the Unveiled installation team unpacked what must be considered one of the exhibition’s most glamorous gowns – a glorious number designed by Norman Hartnell for Margaret Whigham, a British society beauty who married Charles Sweeney, a movie-star handsome American, in 1933. While one of the most glamorous, it is also the most tricky toRead more
This week it has been full steam ahead in the VISA Platinum Gallery. The crates carrying Unveiled: 200 Years of Wedding Fashion from the Victoria and Albert Museum, London arrived by sea, and Keira Miller and Sarah Scott from the V&A arrived by air. Over the last week Keira and Sarah,Read more
Here Come the Brides: Packing and Mounting Unveiled Join Keira Miller from the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, for fascinating behind-the-scenes insights into the preparation of Unveiled: 200 Years of Wedding Fashion from the Victoria and Albert Museum, London on Saturday 17 December at 1pm. Keira’s talk will cover textile conservation,Read more
Carefully packed into custom-made crates, the exhibition Unveiled: 200 Years of Wedding Fashion from the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, has departed Melbourne for Wellington by sea. In the meantime, it’s been all go in Te Papa’s Textile Store with the arrival of our New Zealand commissions – or at least two of them.Read more
The young Queen avidly recorded details of her wedding to her ‘precious Angel’ in her journal, including descriptions of her wedding attire and her whirling emotions. On the evening of her wedding she confided: ‘My dearest dearest dear Albert… his excessive love and affection gave me feelings of heavenly love and happiness, I neverRead more
As we build up to the much anticipated December opening of Unveiled: 200 Years of Wedding Fashion from the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, it is time to ‘unveil’ our three New Zealand designers! As part of the exhibition Te Papa has commissioned three very different New Zealand designers to create theirRead more
I have recently returned from a long weekend in Melbourne. I popped over primarily to see the exhibition Vienna: Art + Design at the National Gallery of Victoria (which was well worth it), but also took the opportunity to catch up on some of Victoria’s other wonderful offerings, including the JohnstonRead more
