A Fine Vintage #2: Nicolas Ghesquiere for Balenciaga Spring 2002

Do you remember the most coveted fashion item for Spring 2002?  Let me jog your memory...

That is the former model, muse, now shoe designer, Tabitha Simmons wearing the hottest pants of 2002.  Everyone wanted those slouchy army green cargo pants and they still look good.  I loved this collection because it was such a cool and relaxed silhouette.  Of course, there was a little fashion drama and scandale when Ghesquiere was called out for a very direct inspiration of an obscure San Francisco designer, Kaisik Wong's 1973 patchwork vest.  But all is fair in love and fashion and I loved the vest and perhaps it brought some attention to the work of Wong (who died of Aids related leukemia in 1990.

I wish Ghesquiere would revisit this silhouette for Louis Vuitton where everything has been very trim and fitted.

Anyhoo, here is a fine vintage by Nicolas Ghesquiere for Balenciaga from Spring 2002.  Enjoy!

p.s. I am always looking for Ghesquiere for Balenciaga runway pieces, so if you have any Balenciaga hanging in your closet and you are ready to part with, please get in touch with us at info@rarevintage.com!

xo, Juliana

Dakota Johnson Rising Style Star!

So how amazing has Dakota Johnson looked for her 50 Shades of Grey press junket?!  I LOVE all of the Julie de Libran for Sonia Rykiel too that she has been wearing like this jumpsuit and vest - and the Rykiel shoes are great too.  

at Saturday Night Live in Sonia Rykiel

in Dior and Jenna Fischer jewelry

on the Today show in fuzzy and leather Balenciaga

and in a beautiful and bohemian Chanel couture from 2014 sparkly gown - have to say, it was a great decision to lose the jacket and flats and add a simple strappy heel...

from the Chanel runway

and in an ethereal Hedi Slimane for Saint Laurent gown

and in Julie de Libran for Sonia Rykiel pre-fall cape and I think a Proenza Schouler striped top

xo, Juliana

Bunny Mellon Style

I am sure you know, Cristóbal Balenciaga did the complete wardrobe of Madame Bunny Mellon until he retired and Hubert de Givenchy took over - Mrs. Mellon even had her own atelier in Maison Givenchy.

"She was very shy, very timid.  I never thought she would order any clothes from me.  But the next collection, we sent off sketches and samples and she ordered a lot of clothes."

Givenchy

Givenchy even made her gardening hats - which is really the ne plus extra in chic don't you think...

"I made hats in denim, and jean, and cotton.  Because Bunny bought in quantity.  And sometimes I would say to her, 'Bunny why do you need so many?'  And she'd say, 'Because I might lose it.'"

Givenchy

So, as I was reading and looking through the catalogs last night, I saw a photo of Mrs. Mellon that I had not seen before and fell in love with how chic and classic she looked in this particular photo:

I was very fortunate to have bought a couple of Mrs. Mellon's Balenciaga's a few years ago for RARE vintage and you can see them here and here.

xo, Juliana

Mary de Rothschild. Part One. Balenciaga

"Where clothes are concerned, the only person I trust is Balenciaga."
Mary de Rothschild

A 1960 black silk Balenciaga coat given by the Baroness Alain de Rothschild (Mary de Rothschild) to the V & A museum.

Mary de Rothschild drawn by Cecil Beaton.

and wearing Balenciaga and painted by Balthus in 1958.

Memories of Florette, head vendeuse for Cristobal Blaenciaga.

Florette's clients included five or six Rothschilds, of whom her absolute favorite was the Baroness Alain de Rothschild, a sweet and beautiful woman who was painted by Balthus in a black Balenciaga coat.

The Baroness Alain was referred to as the Baroness Alain.  Her sister-in-law Cécile de Rothschild, while also a baroness, was Mlle Cécile and just plain Cécile to Florette in the fitting room.  

Florette and Cécile shared a passion for gardening and all her life she kept a set of gardeing tools Cécile had given her.  "I always very open with Cécile, more than with the Baroness Alain.  One day I said to her,  "how can you and your friends spend a fortune on a dress you only wear once.  For me, it's fine because it's how I earn my living, but it seems a little outlandish."  

She said, "Florette, you don't realize with the life we lead - the servants, the houses, the upkeep - the money we spend on clothes is just a drop in the bucket."

"I had never thought of that," said Florette.

Excerpted from The Master of Us All: Balenciaga, His Workrooms, His World by Mary Blume.

Love and kisses, Juliana

Best Dressed: Stephanie Seymour in Vintage Balenciaga

There were some beautiful dresses at the Met gala this year but my favorite (well, besides my friend Regina's 1930s Charles James - and my haute couture dress which was not vintage and I will write about soon) was Stephanie Seymour in a petal pink vintage Balenciaga ruffled gown.  She really looked beautiful.

And the dress!  I have always loved this dress.  She was photographed in it for Vogue awhile back and I loved it then.  But really, what is not to love?  The color (which is much more accurate in the photo below then on the above red carpet Met gala arrivals photos) is stunning, the ruffles are divine, it is 1960s Balenciaga...  You know, I also love and admire that Stephanie Seymour was not adverse to the volume either.  I know, from having RARE vintage, many women will not wear volume of any sort and I thought it was amazing that she wore it and of course, she looked absolutely beautiful.

The dress reminds me of Irving Penn's flower photographs...

love and kisses, Juliana

My Date for the 2014 Met Gala was Charles James

Well, not exactly - but my date for the Met gala did wear a Charles James periwinkle blue silk chiffon gown from the 1930s.  Do you know what the chances were of someone actually wearing a Charles James dress to the the Charles James exhibit at the Met?  Well, as the saying goes a million to one.  It is all the more surprising because Charles James, famously difficult, loathe to even actually give his dresses to the clients who had paid for them, had a remarkable but small production.  There simply are not many Charles James pieces out there.  They rarely come up for auction, are seldom even seen and there are very few still privately owned.

But my date, my friend and vintage haute couture collector, Regina Drucker, wore not, only a Charles James gown but an extremely rare and exceptionally early 1930s gown.   Regina, for obvious reasons, is my frenemy because I love her very amazing collection and every so often, we discover we have been bidding against each other at an auction for the same item - great minds think alike!

Regina was recently featured in the Financial Times in an article on Conceptual Fashion (you can read it here).  Regina collects important  pieces by Issey Miyake and had bought an early 1970s Miyake linen jumpsuit from RARE vintage.  She obviously has very good taste ; )

The Financial Times referred to 'wearer-collectors' and I like that term very much.  You can be collector  and a wearer but being a wearer comes with some responsibilities.  Sometimes the wearer-collector even saves a vintage piece that some may have felt was not worth the trouble but as you will see with Regina's Met gala outfit, it was very well worth the trouble and challenges.

So Regina wore an early 1930s Charles James periwinkle blue silk chiffon dress with streamers.  She paired it with a 1960s Balenciaga coat the color of fallen autumn leaves and a Stephen Jones feathered head piece and vintage Manolo Blahniks.

At The Mark, a few hours before the Met gala...

A detail of the back of the dress with its distinctive and thoroughly unconventional cowl like back with the streamers pulling through...

Here is a detail of Charles James' signature seaming - he did things no other designer would do - the angled seaming slopes diagonally from the hip to the center and then straight down:

Front detail with its folded over edge making a shawl collar:

And a note on Regina's Balenciaga coat which she had restored by a priest, by hand... it looks like feathers but it is actually organza with a frayed edge and each organza curl was heated and curled by hand to resemble a feather - there are hundreds and hundreds of these organza curls!  And it is absolutely breathtakingly beautiful!

The pale seashell pink Stephen Jones feather headpiece you see in the photo below is flecked with little crystals and was a purchase from RARE vintage.  You see, Regina does have very good taste!

Regina was a smashing success in her James and Balenciaga, Stephen Jones ensemble, with Hamish Bowles, Stephen Jones, Alber Elbaz and more all running up to her...

I love you Regina and thank you for being my date, we had a grand time! Juliana

A Balenciaga Cocktail Dress. Provenance: Mrs. Rachel Bunny Mellon

One of my favorite pieces at RARE vintage is a very rare, mossy greens silk Balenciaga cocktail dress, scattered with pink and poppy red dahlias that had belonged to Mrs. Rachel 'Bunny' Mellon.  

1962 Bunny Mellon Provenance Balenciaga cocktail dress.  Available for purchase at RARE vintage. 

Clothing to me, is imbued with the spirit of the person who originally fell in love with it.  Sometimes, I think people believe that I want to hear "this was never worn", when it is actually quite the opposite.  I prefer to know that the dress I am buying, even if it was just for one night, had a grand time and created a memory.

But back to our Balenciaga cocktail dress.  It is symbolic not just because Bunny Mellon was a great client of Balenciaga, a couturier who, like Mrs. Mellon, desired privacy and avoided journalists, but the dress, with its painterly flowers, is also a reflection of Mrs. Mellon's passionate interest in gardening and her extraordinary Oak Springs Garden Library.

A Style Icon of a Different Sort: Mrs. Rachel Bunny Mellon

Bunny Mellon was not as beautiful as Babe Paley.  She was well known for being a client of Balenciaga but unlike another famous client of Balenciaga, there are no portraits of her in black and white posing for Cecil Beaton in a robe déshabillé in a grand room at the Hotel Lambert in Paris.  Like Barbara Hutton she was born into great wealth but she did not squander her money nor waste her time with princes and playboys.

Rachel 'Bunny' Mellon was a woman in full.  Nothing was too small to escape her notice but it was not a dress to impress mentality, it was about collecting pieces she loved, whether in art, garden seeds or fashion.  And really, if you could have someone make, not only your cocktail dresses, but your entire wardrobe from your gardening hats to your staff's uniforms wouldn't you want it to be Balenciaga or Hubert de Givenchy too?

"This garden is made of love.  And details." Bunny Mellon told Vanity Fair in a rare interview in 2010.  And I think the feeling of love and details that extended from her wardrobe to her homes and to her gardens is what made her a true icon of Style.

There have been few but tantalizing peeks into the secret world of Bunny Mellon and what is so remarkable when you see the interiors and the gardens that she created is how timeless they are.  Everything is just so but nothing appears too precious, too showy.  So often I see a house in a magazine overly decorated, a Marilyn Minter or Murakami painting placed too prominently, or everything looks like it was purchased by the decorator and nothing by the home owner.  But Mrs. Mellon was a woman with passionate interests and ideas.  Mrs. Mellon described wandering into Mark Rothko's studio one day near her former home on 70th street in New York and quickly purchasing 13 of his paintings, including the serenely beautiful 'Yellow Expanse'.

"Nothing should be noticed.  Nothing should be noticed." said Mrs. Mellon to Sarah Booth Conroy in a rare interview to the New York Times in 1969.  "Nothing should stand out.  It all should give the feeling of calm, you should only remember the peace."  

The extraordinary gardening room at Oak Springs in Upperville Virgina:

A detail from the Fernand Renard trompe l'oeil painted room:

Notice the simple teak stools with the soft curve, the beehive shaped basket - the Bunny is in the details...

I love the Jane Canfield bunny who looks like he got caught with a bag of vegetables and herbs from the garden...

I don't mean to gush but gush I must.  Bunny Mellon had an incredible eye for color.  

Mark Rothko's Yellow Expanse in the library at Oak Springs:

 the pale seashell pink living room in the Mellon's former Manhattan townhouse with a John Singer Sargent painting above the mantel.  I love the lucite console behind the chintz covered sofa and the mocha upholstered chairs.

the Yves Klein blue crosshatched painted dining room in the Manhattan residence with thyme, rosemary topiaries which Mrs. Mellon became famous for:

in Antigua, a framed museum Mark Rothko museum poster (!) - and of course, this is from a woman who had an absolutely stunning and incredible art collection.

The Oak Spring Garden library which is so beautiful.  I can just imagine the "Mrs" as she was called having her coca cola and looking at the scrapbook Jacqueline Kennedy gave her of the White House Rose Gardens Mrs. Mellon created and in which Jackie Kennedy pressed flowers from the garden...

love, kisses and thoughts on a true style icon, Juliana