Gianni Versace and the Plump Mermaids

Summer is here!  Finally!  in New York.  And just in time for Memorial Day and summer holidays in the Hamptons, the South of France, Sardinia, Tuscany, Greece...  so my mindset immediately shifts to the hunt for chic resort wear.  

One of my favorite new finds for RARE vintage is this amazing Gianni Versace couture silk top.  I am very selective when buying Gianni's silk shirts because some of them can be, well, a tad too Miami back in the day, for me personally.  

But this one - which has no buttons - it just ties in the front - has an incredible print of plump mermaids floating on the front with their tails wrapping around the side of the shirt was too incredible to pass resist.  There are golden Medusa heads too and then a more restrained (for Gianni who could go a little wild with these silk tops) colorful stripes on the back.  There are also gumdrop yellow buttons with Medusa's on the cuffs - and these are almost one of my favorite things about this blouse.

Gianni Versace's plump mermaids:

the golden Medusa's:

Who I Spys a mermaid tail?

Very fabulous with jeans, shorts, a white pant don't you think?!

Channeling Chic: Catherine Deneuve in YSL Silk Scarf Blouse

I saw this fantastic photo of Catherine Deneuve in a graphic striped silk Yves Saint Laurent rive gauche blouse on Habitually Chic and it made me swoon all over again for the classic staple of the YSL wardrobe.  I think tomorrow I will channel CD in YSL and wear one of my beloved YSL silk scarf blouses, bowed at the neck and maybe even a big swoop in my hair. 

Saint Laurent designed an infinite variety of silk blouses: some with scarves, some without, some in a deep blue, some in an ever so slightly lighter shade of blue - it's was so interesting when we had a large collection of YSL blouses and we lined them up by color - it was like a pantone color chart in silk - some blouses buttoned down the front, some buttoned on the side, the variety and colors seem endless.  And YSL silk stripes at RARE vintage...

For more information or to purchase please email info@rarevintage.com or phone 212.581.7273

YSL: The Assurance of Dreams

The setting: Vogue 1976.  

The Description: "It's a dream," my neighbor said.  She was quite literally right.  Dreams are the language of the subconscious and color belongs to the subconscious of Western culture.  Saint Laurent said it took him only three weeks to design this collection and that, for the first time, he was able to set it all down, at once and definitively, in drawings that had the somnambulistic assurance of dreams. 

by Pierre Schneider

  

The photos: 

 

 Photographs by Duane Michaels

A Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche Russian Collection silk blouse:

 

1970s Russian Collection print silk blouse.  Size 36.

"Astounding color, radiant gold, fabrics like cobwebs veiling rich skin... purple panne velvet, emerald silk faille, patterned lamé .."

 Textured rust colored silk Yves Saint Laurent blouse.  Buttons on the side.  Size 36.

PURCHASE

INQUIRY