A Most Beguiling Accomplishment

I've been gradually releasing this announcement over various platforms as things get more solid. This is a pretty serious platform, so I wanted to wait until everything was totally and completely for certain. (I'm writing this ahead of time, when things are only about 99.9999% certain, and I'm so nervous about that last 0.0001%, I can't even.) Starting very soon, I'm going to be the collections manager/educator at the Silas Wright House/St. Lawrence County Historical Association (http://slcha.org/)! This is it, this is the first step in my career, my first permanent position in a museum. This is terrifying and unsettling. This probably means not too much for the blog. I should be able to manage a job as well as one post a week! If anything, I may get to write about specific objects in the collections or people and events of the area, either for myself or for the museum. Also, you know what's really my bag. Patterns. Access to what looks like a pretty sizable ...

Boston MFA 44.1527 New coiffure: the front straight, ending in a frizzed  hérisson , the bottom of the Coiffure in the back and on the sides like the coiffure à l'enfance . The whole wrapped with a flower crown. ( 1781 )

(Way back when I was translating the Galerie , I came to two books - the 38th and 39th - which weren't included in the reprint. From the index, I could see that they were coiffures, and since they seemed less pressing than the gowns I let them wait. And then I forgot about them.) Boston MFA 44.1526 Coiffure of a white straw hat edged with a colored ribbon. Crown surrounded by a wide ribbon, with a bow in the front. It is decorated with flowers and covered with straight hair over a toque which is low in front and larger in the back. Two curls and a favori; loose chignon and two curls hanging in back. ( 1781 )

I haven't done a portrait costume analysis in a long time, but it seemed like the most appropriate way to deal with the second Historical Sew Monthly challenge: Blue. Marie-Antoinette dit « à la Rose »,  Marie Louise Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, 1783; Versailles  MV 3893 This portrait of the twenty-eight-year-old Marie Antoinette was painted in the same year as the famous portrait en chemise  - in fact, it was painted in order to replace  the chemise portrait with something less scandalous. (You may notice that she's standing in the same pose , holding the same ribboned rose, with the same hairstyle and same expression.) While this blue taffeta gown is more traditional than the chemise, it's nothing like a robe de cour  or a robe parée - two outfits worn daily at court for formal occasions. This is still a very fashionable and casual ensemble. Starting at the top: instead of the straw hat worn in the original, this version of Marie Antoinette is...