1920s

Roaring Prohibitions

Today in bar prep, I have been “furiously” reviewing Criminal Procedure. All the terminology stirs the imagination towards gangster movies. “Terry” frisks? Search and Seizures? Warrant based off an anonymous tip? You gotta be kiddin me… I got my rights!

You know the Hollywood schmaltz.

In the fervor of the period, here’s today’s selection from my very own rotating crap game. Don’t ask questions. After all, you know the score, kid.

Now scram (if you know what’s good for ya).

Silk Romper, Anyone?

As some of you may know who have been following me, I have recently aquired a very strong taste for the indomintable Australian myestery series, Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, which I also mentioned as the inspiration for this post, and have been shamelessly sharing screenshots on tumblr here. Well, needless to say, I am intriuged by the series, but it’s a toss up as to whether I am more bewitched by the costuming or the story lines. That is to say, the costumes are that good. Seriously, her be-turbaned, dropwaist, fur lined, silk embroidered flapper chic is everything I want all the time.

Well, in one of the first episodes of the first season, she popped out of her boudoir wearing only a silk slip romper. The screen shot opportunity was limited (as you can tell), but since then I’ve been intent on finding something similar. It seems like the perfect garment: cool and loose against the skin, while still elegantly sensual and effortless. The only problem is that it is requiring a lot of effort. Namely, I can’t find any.

So far, I’ve only been able to find the one below (now on sale at Anthropologie) as a close second. I’ve perused etsy and found two or three vintage options on etsy, but as could be expected, anything silky and vintage from the 1940s or before is pricing in the 200 dollar range.

Salua Chloe Silk Romper from Anthropologie.

I thought I’d now extend my search to reach out to you. Have any of you seen anything like this under 100? Or is that just an unrealistic dream? Are there any brands (small or large) who do this sort of thing? Please help!

Getting Jazzed for the Tonys

Get excited theatre lovers! Today is none other than the Tony Awards!! To celebrate the occasion, I had to don something sufficiently zany, but (if I do say so myself) wholeheartedly FABULOUS. Can’t you just see Gloria Swanson walking down a boardwalk adorned as such, tipping her sunglasses and crooking those ominous eyebrows? Or maybe I could belatedly join Anything Goes? I think the closest aesthetic I could fit to anything currently playing would be the King and I, up for a best revival nomination, but it’s quite a stretch (and I’d need to trade in the trousers for a hoop skirt). Ah well, I will have to content myself to watching. For those of you who don’t know, competing for Best Musical are:

An American in Paris: two (coincidentally very good dancers) fall in love in Paris after WW2- think old Gene Kelly
Fun Home- a woman realizes she’s a lesbian at the same time her father struggles with the fact he is gay- based on Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel)
Something Rotten- two aspiring playwrights try to outdo Shakespeare in the 1590s by writing the first musical- the makers of Avenue Q and Book of Mormon collaborate on this for nothing short of comic hilarity
The Visit- the richest woman in the world returns to her poverty-stricken hometown. What will happen?- based on a Swiss 1956 play of the same name (but in Swiss)

For Best Original score, switch out An American in Paris and add The Last Ship, or Sting’s (you heard me right) new musical currently on Broadway. The musical focuses on a man who returns to the shipyards of his hometown after his father’s death and tries to woo an old flame…

I am very conflicted as to what to vote for. Fun Home is probably the most controversial, and though it addresses issues not covered before of the Great White Way, to me the modern musical scores are kind of hokey. Ring of keys (the song that will be preformed from it tonight) centers around the word “swagger,” which ends up annoying me so much that I can’t listen to it. Telephone Wire is catchier, but uses what seems to me an obvious metaphor that feels stale when it becomes more of a symbol than an object.

I haven’t heard how they’ve redone an American in Paris or anything from The Visit. Something Rotten is very funny but has frequent language (making it, I think, less applicable to universal audiences, even if it is truer to Shakespeare’s usage). Further, as the title promises, a lot of the jokes are “rotten” as in more base toilet humor, which I find boring after a few times, personally. So! I guess I’ll just have to see who wins.

Real talk: Today’s outfit was shamelessly inspired by the wardrobe of the heroine in my new favorite Murder Mysteries Mini-series (scoot over Angela Landsbury). Meet Miss Phryne Fisher of Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries. There will be more to come on this topic in future posts.

Flapper Christmas

Merry Christmas all from the Clothesline! We hope your day is the bees knees, and that you get wonderful gifts from people as lovely as yourself. Personally, I like to make sure my presence is a present, so I took the following sartorial approach. Remember- life is a banquet; don’t be one of the poor suckers starving to death!

Outfit Details: Dress: Carolyne Barton Night (vintage) | Tights: Primark | Shoes: Rampage (old) | Cloche: a gift! (unbranded) | Poison ring: vintage

Thanks to:
Pictures: Madeline Arnall
Lighting: Harrison Mowell

Throw Back Thursday: Vizcaya

It was last year, around this time, and I was deeply, madly, unabashedly in love with a certain pair of Anthropologie shorts. So much so, that I still have the picture I took as reference so that I could show the workers what they looked like (just in case) as I began the long wait for what is the double markdown (or bi-annual sale on the sales) at Anthro.

Well, mere moments after I finally got the shorts of my dreams, we threw ourselves in the car and went to Miami (clearly in the honeymoon phase). I’m afraid that today, besides telling you that my shoes were Clarks, watch was Target, shirt was GAP, and glasses were Disney, this isn’t about fashion. This is a travel blog.

Allow me to take you to one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been:

from Instagram.

Vizcaya. Nestled down a verdant road across from the planetarium in Miami is a palisade befitting Fitzgerald’s musings. All at once a coral cove, deserted beach, Victorian jaunt, and tycoon’s mistress, Vizcaya sits on the coast pleasantly secluded from downtown Miami, but with a perfect view of the skyscrapers in the not-so-distance.

Built in 1914 on 180 acres, Vizcaya was the European-inspired brainchild of American harvesting magnate James McCormick-Deering. They wouldn’t let me take pictures of the inside (I did manage one or two equally sneaky and shaky ones that aren’t worth showing), and I would like to note that these were all taken on my Iphone. With that in mind, try to envision how much better the real thing is…

Instagram ftw

The entrance to the pool:

From Instagram

I particularly loved this man-made island-functioning-as-a-dock right outside the sitting room.

The Atrium. I just wanted to sit there and write poetry. Alternatively, it seems like the perfect arena to reenact the Liesal/ Kurt Sixteen Going on Seventeen love scene if anyone would like to oblige my ever present need to jump across benches.

From Instagram.

Too bad there were no benches. I suppose that would make a good subject for a terrible poem. The Gardens: I know this is a bit different than the regularly scheduled program, but it was so beautiful (and my shorts were so en pointe— even after two markdowns), I thought it might make for a nice stroll down memory lane.

Shared to TrendSpin on TheFashionCanvas and Simbaco’s Instagram Travel Thursday (on that note, I’m @bexwrecks on instagram if you’d like to follow me).

The Clothesline

Style for people blowing in the wind