5 Areas to Shop like a Parisian: A Local Guide to Paris Boutique Shopping

If you’re coming to Paris looking for the glitzy Parisian equivalent of the Rodeo Drives, Fifth Avenues and Sloane Streets of the world, turn back now, this is not the guide for you. But if you’re looking for unique, chic and affordable Parisian fashion boutiques set in charming local neighbourhoods where actual Parisians really shop, then…

Wig Holes and Other Mysteries of Powdered Hair History Explained

There was a time when a visit to the powder room involved more than a quick tinkle and a dab of powder on the nose. Taking its name from the noble courts of Europe, the powder room was a designated space, in aristocratic houses, for the powdering of wigs that were a little worse for…

Before the Flapper, There Was the Gibson Girl

Before the flapper came about as the embodiment of 1920s femininity, women in the late 1800s and early 1900s had a different role model from which to take cues – the Gibson Girl. She was the feminine ideal of this era and socially, the Gibson Girl had a very defined role. She was upper class, educated, athletic,…

Forget the Met Ball, Discover New York’s Secret Fashion Paradise

Nestled into a hilltop of northern Manhattan hides a veritable medieval oasis, older than the United States itself. A labyrinth of ancient French archways, turrets, and Gothic chapels that travelled across the Atlantic to find a new home here, it is known simply as “the Cloisters” to locals. The cavernous site could pass as a…

Is this History’s Most Underrated Dress?

A couturier-friend of mine once wryly remarked (as she meticulously contemplated the exact landing spot of another rose-gold sequin destined for the bust of a ballgown) that her life effectively was a fashionable road-map signposted by all the memorable gowns she’s made for brides, debutantes and society ladies over the decades. Similarly we fashionistas and…

No, the Other Naomi: An American Supermodel’s Overlooked Legacy

There is much debate on who was the first Black supermodel. Several Black models have accumulated a series of firsts between them throughout history; Helen Williams became one of the most familiar faces in Black advertising in the 1950s, Donyale Luna was the first African-American model to appear on the cover of the British edition of Vogue in 1966,…

This Forgotten 1980s Style Movement Explains A Lot About Fashion Today

When we think of the fashion industry’s most influential movers & shakers and icon-makers of the last 50 years, familiar names like Anna Wintour, Karl Lagerfeld, Grace Coddington or Patricia Field (Sex & the City) come to mind. But there’s another name that got left down the back of fashion history’s sofa – Buffalo –…

Vogue’s Fabulous Five: The Golden Age of Illustration

When we think of Vogue we visualise a vibrant, striking, photographic image adorning the front cover of the seminal publication, but the first pictorial cover would not appear until 1932. Before the likes of Helmut Newton, Richard Avedon, Annie Lebovitz and Steven Meisel, it was the time of the illustrator. Early 20th century artists George…

Dressing the Woman in Gold: The Unknown Bohemian Designer behind the Paintings

You know a Gustav Klimt painting when you see one. His gold leaf Japanese-influenced portraits of women, one of the most famous of which was the subject of a major Hollywood film (Woman in Gold), dressed in vibrant, multi-colored and almost psychedelic prints, saw him become one of the most prominent painters of his era.…

In 19th Century Paris, She Held a Permit to Wear Pants

A cigarette-smoking, pants-wearing, animal-dissecting painter, Rosa Bonheur spent her life doing exactly as she pleased. 2022 marks the bicentenary of the birth an artist who opened countless doors for female creatives, both in her home country of France and abroad. Born in 1822 in Bordeaux, Rosa Bonheur was the daughter of Sophie Marquis, a piano…