Lace and Line

Remember poor old Anne Hathaway at the Oscars this year? Her necklace was so wrong for her gown, and she looked like she was being strangled. It is very hard to choose one’s accessories of course, especially when one has a stylist whispering wicked nothings in one’s ear. But fear not, SNAP is here to right fashion wrongs.

A neckline serves to frame one’s face, and there are of course more or less flattering necklines for every figure. In turn, a necklace should enhance a neckline, and draw the eye, and lace and line should certainly not engage in battle.

A case in point: this giant bauble necklace – a statement piece if there ever was one – while complemented by the polka dot vintage 50s blouse, is engulfed by the collar and vee-neckline. It and I need air to breathe.

… lace and line should certainly not engage in battle.

Swap the blouse for a striped kimono top with a slashed neckline and suddenly everything is okay. There is enough skin to frame the necklace and I no longer look like I am being choked. And the baubles look just as cute with a different type of graphic pattern. (The right necklace for the blouse, incidentally, would be something like a delicate and short chain that did not fall below the apex of the vee.)

Right, now go forth and decorate thyself!

Polka Face

Since my recent experiment with black feather eyelashes, I have fallen in love with falsies. I am usually too lazy or too hurried to put on eye makeup, but these little darlings have changed my mind. So fun! So cute! And now I have polka-dot feathers to dance with too. 

What I Actually Wore #0075

Serial #: 0075
Date: 26/07/2012
Weather: 16°C, cool
Time Allowed: 10 minutes

Last winter I was on a bit of a Ballet Russes kick – that is, I was enjoying mixing up prints and textures and layering my clothes.

The wool cable knit dress needs layering in winter certainly, and that was provided by a fine knit striped tee from Free People with a silk short sleeved vintage 80s shirt on top. Since the shirt was spotty, I thought it would be cute to echo that shape with pompom earrings that I made myself, and my 1940s pompom headband. That accessory always draws stares.

Instead of boring old black opaques, I wear chocolate brown stockings and tower on suede shoes that have patent wedge heels. I love the contrast between the two types of leather. The blue is such a brilliant pop of colour too. When the weather is so dull and dreary there’s no reason to blend into the landscape!

Items:

Dress: Far Away From Close for Anthropologie
Tee: Free People
Shirt: Milo’s
Headband: vintage 40s
Earrings: handmade
Rings: (onyx) souvenir (silver) Roun
Watch: Kenneth Cole
Shoes: Mollini

The Bohemian History of the Polka Dot

Where do polka dots come from, and why do they have such a quirky name? As strange as it seems, the pattern is named for the dance of the same name.

In the mid nineteenth century, with the advent of machinery in textile factories, the spotted repeat pattern had come into fashion. Prior to this – in medieval times for example – dotted fabrics had not been worn, for without machinery it is difficult to create a spotted pattern with evenly spaced dots, and random spots were associated with disease.

Polka dotted smock top over black skirt by Balenciaga, ph Gordon Parks, LIFE magazine March 1951In the 1840s–60s, dancing the energetic polka was a craze that swept Europe. The dance is of Bohemian origin, associated with Poland and Czechoslovakia.  Manufacturers – being as sly then as they are today – wishing to cash in on this craze, named a plethora of unrelated products after the polka. There was even a polka pudding, a boozy confection of orange-water flavoured cream, drizzled with sherry polka sauce!

Two fashions collided, and thus the polka dot fabric was christened.

Godey’s Lady’s Book dubbed the dotty pattern the ‘polka dot’. The pattern was popular with both men and women. Soon there were polka curtains, gauze, jackets, hats, neckties, shoes and vests.

Mary-Jane Russell wearing Christian Dior, ph Louise Dahl-WolfeWhile the craze for naming everything under the sun after the polka eventually wore off, the name as it applied to the pattern did not. The polka dot pattern has gone in and out of fashion, and it can now be considered a classic, especially when rendered in black and white. A while back when I was researching artists’ smocks, I came across a 1951 photograph of a Balenciaga outfit featuring a polka-dotted smock top. It struck me as extremely similar to a vintage top I own, so here is my little homage both to Balenciaga and the polka dot.

Read more detailed histories of the polka dot pattern here and here, or view a slideshow featuring fashions from 1865–2010.

Marilyn Monroe in a polka dot swimsuit, 1951

Dangers Underfoot

Yes, More on Socks

Since I have started wearing socks again I have become aware of a fashion hazard that has hitherto escaped my notice. Not entirely, I hasten to add, for I have long worn black opaque trouser socks under trousers. It’s just that then I didn’t care, because trouser socks are in the main worn only for warmth and are completely hidden by said trousers and winter boots. But now that I have graduated to attractive socks that I want to show off, I have become aware of dangers lying (ahem) underfoot.

What? What could it be? you wonder. Here it is: HEEL RUB.

I can’t be the only one who’s noticed it surely?

You know after you’ve worn a pair of socks a few times you notice that you’ve accidentally worn them every which way, so your heels have rubbed both sides of the sock? What an unsightly appearance they present in shoes with low vamps. Impossible to venture out in public like that. Your socks and your sartorial reputation both in tatters in one fell swoop.

Your socks and your sartorial reputation both in tatters in one fell swoop.

Sure it’s easy to tell which is the right way to pull them on … AFTER THEY’RE RUINED. I remember in the old days they used to sew a little tab or contrasting stitch on the backs of pantyhose so you could tell back from front. They need to do that with socks. And in the glory days there was this thing called a SEAM.

I’ve just recently bought a number of lovely cotton and woollen over-the-knee socks on ASOS and happily these are real socks, with proper fitted heels and toes – some of them even have contrasting colours. No mistakes with those.

But what of the seamless knitted socks like the polka-dotted and transparent frilly ones I am wearing in the picture above? I may have to obsessively resort to sewing on some invisible-to-the-naked-eye identifying mark myself as a preventative measure.

But I’ve just thought of something else even more horrifying … HOLES.

Darn it! Once, every salty young woman knew how to mend those. Holey-moley, another new-old skill to learn.