The Dauphine's first act of defiance, a 15-year-old's strop, was her refusal to wear the grand corps, the rigid corset permitted only to the court elite. Her second was to learn to ride, and don not only male-style upper-body garments (nothing novel about that, female royals and courtiers had galloped about in similar equine fig since the 1660s), but to wear, and be painted in, breeches, while astride the saddle. Hunting Frenchwomen hid "culottes" under skirts; only the awesome Catherine the Great of Russia and comic actresses flaunted their lower limbs in breeches. Marie Antoinette has always stood as an icon of supreme style, but surprisingly none of her biographers have paid sustained attention to her clothes. In Queen of Fashion, Caroline Weber shows how Marie Antoinette developed her reputation for fashionable excess, and explains through lively, illuminating new research the political controversies that her clothing provoked. Weber surveys Marie Antoinette's "Revolution in Dress," covering each phase of the queen's tumultuous life, beginning with the young girl, struggling to survive Versailles's rigid traditions of royal glamour (twelve-foot-wide hoopskirts, whalebone corsets that crushed her organs). As queen, Marie Antoinette used stunning, often extreme costumes to project an image of power and wage war against her enemies. Gradually, however, she began to lose her hold on the French when she started to adopt "unqueenly" outfits (the provocative chemise) that, surprisingly, would be adopted by the revolutionaries who executed her. They granted the hooligans permission to make the tour of the prison with Madame De lamballes head on the condition they left the corpse at the door’ There were masked balls, she donned a domino, into her company came notorious court seducers and in the company she kept in her small world was not of the court, spies were routed. At nursing or residential homes, the Queen wears strong colours to help those who are visually impaired, and on walkabouts, the crown and brim of her hat will be taken into account.

Her spending was enormous and nobody could dissuade her from it. The poufs were also home to little creatures, vermin took up nests in them, and there were special long combs for scratching your pouf if the vermin were too lively. It's very interesting. If you have any interest in Marie Antoinette or the time period, you should read this. Yes, there are some pictures in there, but they're there to aid you in a visual. I adore the pictures! I think she should have included more. Oh well. Off duty, the Queen likes to dress for country life in a blouse and A-line skirt with a green waxed or quilted coat or a rain mac, her wellies and her familiar silk scarf knotted under her chin. The start of her reign saw classic couture creations of silk and tulle evening gowns by Sir Norman Hartnell and cinch-waisted dresses by Sir Hardy Amies.This captivating, heavily annotated scholarly work offers deep insight into the role of fashion in the queen's life, and which, combined with all the politics, propaganda and lies, contributed to her increased unpopularity and demise. While fashion as a mode of expression will always be part of our lives, to say that its stakes have since greatly changed would be an understatement. As Weber states: "The politics of costume held her—far more than any of history's subsequent fashion queens—quite firmly by the throat." It is best if one has a strong grounding in French history, particularly during the reign of Louis XV as well as revolutionary France to fully appreciate this book. Marie Antoinette emerges as a somewhat willing victim of her fate. As traditional Austrian imperial royalty within the rigid world of Versailles she was characterologically incapable of comprehending the social crisis erupting in France. Her purview was rebellion against the strictures of the court and she used extravagant fashion and expenditure to stage her battles. In this way she guaranteed the enmity among courtiers and the public alike. Perhaps says the author of this book this was ‘ in retaliation for those scenes of appalling aristocratic coldheartedness that the insurgents vowed to make the white haired white skinned, well dressed princess suffer- Lamballe through her brutal death and ritual coiffing , and the Queen through a forced encounter with her friends savagely styled head..’ and yet while her reign lasted she had caused the greatest personages of France to bow to the frivolous yoke of fashion, a fashion of which she was the ingenious and lavish inspirer.'

All I ever knew of Marie. Antoinette before I read this book was that she had been spoiled and that the French courts insane spending while people starved brought the monarchy down, before this book I never thought of her as a human being but her story is moving. When they took Mops from her the one attachment of her grieving heart, she had only them to look too for affection, and was reminded when she burst into tears and flung herself into the arms of one of them , that there would be no more display of tears. She was only a girl, no matter how you look at it, and what she was freighted to carry. On 2 June 1953, Queen Elizabeth II was crowned at Westminster Abbey before a global audience of 20 million people. For many households, the coronation brought television into the home for the first time. What they witnessed was the pinnacle of costume drama as a 26-year-old woman pledged her life to the service of the nation. The Coronation

But despite them all, she is launched a great soft big bird in paint and curls and refreshing too, after the the stiff ladies in the Dauphine boudoir. The monarch has see-through “Birdcage” brollies made by the Fulton group to match each outfit in case of wet weather, with the edging and handle corresponding to the exact shade she is wearing. Cecil Beaton, who captured the official coronation portraits, described how the combination of sumptuous gown, ceremonial robes and Crown Jewels imbued her with a "Byzantine magnificence." But such opulence was not purely gratuitous. Throughout history it has served an important constitutional purpose: to reinforce the status of the monarch and distinguish them from the people and palaces that surround them. The Queen’s clothes needed to ensure she looked as she should: like a Queen. Couture Queen The wretched state of the people while Louis danced, hunted, and copulated from his assembled deer girls and then an alliance with a not French bride for his son, was too much, for the people, her great show of wealth thought right for court audiences, were to the person with a starving child or no money for bread a terrible goad. This is probably the 5th times I've read this novel. I received this book as a gift for my sweet 16th birthday (the theme was masquerade/costumes, which I went as Marie Antoinette). One of my good friends got this book for me. When I got it, I wanted to go home and read it right then and there. However, I restrained myself.

Occasionally (more than occasionally perhaps) the effort to tie all of Marie Antoinette's behaviors and the reactive responses of her many enemies to fashion cultural codes was a bit strained. That is a minor quibble however. Trips to Canada featured red and white ensembles in tribute to the Canadian flag, along with her diamond maple leaf brooch, while her first high-profile and diplomatically sensitive visit to Ireland saw the monarch choose green – the Republic’s national colour.Of course they could have left her her little dog. Her attachments would be ruthlessly pruned and chosen right down to her little dog , the consolation of her journey from her family, forever as it happened. The gold dress she wore for the 2012 Diamond Jubilee palace pop concert was influenced by the golden figure on the Queen Victoria Memorial, around which the stage was constructed. How far the barb had entered peoples hearts showed in the ruthless dispatch of this effete class , it became know as the Terror, days of terrible bloodshed. And while the special occasion could see some nods to the platinum theme, the style will be the familiar one that has developed throughout her record-breaking reign. The immensity of her power, is something to consider, when you think of of the consequence for the Dauphine, Rose in her flounces with her pretty face, a good bosom, is though constantly reminded to know her place.

While this book is not perfect, it points out that clothing is a method of communication which greatly affects human interaction. Even today, in a less charged atmosphere than the French court, what we choose to wear (or not wear) says a lot about our social, economic, political and religious affiliations. She was not to be subjected to any ugly people and so only beautiful faces were sent out to greet her. This book should definitely be read after one reads Antonia Fraser's "Marie Antoniette: A Journey." This is not a definitive biography, nor does it claim to be. However, it looks at the ill-fated queen in a unique and textual way- through the clothing choices she made at every juncture in her tenure as Dauphine, and later Queen of France.I feel that a lot of the book was a stretch--the brand-new Dauphine notices a tapestry of Jason and Medea, calls it a "bad omen" for a wedding, and we assume that it plants in her mind the idea to manipulate fashion for power? Yeah, probably not.