History of Fashion
Final Paper Proposal
Diana Yichu Cao
Prospective Image #1 (PREFERRED):
The above photograph was captured on the 7th of August in 1967, during the so-called “Summer of Love,” in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. The photograph features George Harrison with his then-wife, Pattie Boyd, an English model whom he met on the set of A Hard Day’s Night, both costumed in strikingly psychedelic ensembles. During the latter half of the sixties, Haight-Ashbury functioned as a cultural epicenter of the Psychedelic movement and the birthplace of the counterculture movement in America. The neighborhood was home to some of the most prominent psychedelic rock bands of that particular era, most notably the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane.
During the first week of August in 1967, George and Pattie embarked on a six-day trip to Los Angeles and stopped in San Francisco afterwards to visit Pattie’s sister, Jenny Boyd (a fellow model). The couple was purportedly mobbed by Haight-Ashbury residents who quickly recognized the Beatle and his wife; as they traipsed through the neighborhood, more and more people began to follow them, until finally they were led to the colloquially named “Hippie Hill,” on which George was handed a guitar and asked to play a few songs. Given that he and his wife had just taken LSD, Harrison could only handle playing a few chords on the instrument before handing it back to its respective owner.
The sartorial decisions of Harrison and Boyd are interesting in that they not only reflect the prominent colors, patterns and silhouettes lauded by the Haight-Ashbury hippies, but they also demonstrate a shift in Harrison’s personal style (in both a sartorial and musical context) in response to a trip he took to India eleven months prior, during which he studied the sitar under the instruction of the celebrated Indian musician Ravi Shankar. It was after this life-changing trip that a considerable shift in the Beatles’ collective appearance and sound occurred.
During the earlier half of the decade, the Beatles’ look was characterized by slim-fitting made-to-measure single-breasted suits with white shirts and black ties (very much inspired by the Teddy Boy look of the 1950s). The Beatles also celebrated and popularized the collarless suit by Pierre Cardin. It wasn’t until 1967, however, that the four Liverpudlians formally rejected the uniformity of their early image in favor of more individualistic looks that encapsulated the psychedelic phenomenon that was also underway. With the release of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band in June of 1967, the band’s newfound propensity for psychedelia and experimentation and an embrace of multiculturalism was readily apparent.
The vibrant colors and patterns worn by Boyd and Harrison during their Haight-Ashbury trip stand in stark contrast to what the couple would’ve worn so much as a year prior. Their outfits demonstrate a very clear eastern influence, from the bold red and purple hues in Harrison’s trousers and Boyd’s empire-waist mini dress, to the geometric patterns in both of the aforementioned garments. Harrison wears a denim jacket, an article of clothing that functioned as an integral component of the implicit Hippie/Counterculture uniform, ornamented with pin-back buttons, a crucial accoutrement of this era (typically, these buttons featured protest statements or imagery). Both Harrison and Boyd are adorned in necklaces (“Love Beads,” as they were often called), which was another prominent counterculture accessory. The similarities in Harrison and Boyd’s respective ensembles demonstrates the blurring of gendered fashion during this particular era, albeit Harrison largely stuck to a more traditionally masculine silhouette than, say, Hendrix or Jagger.
It’s interesting to note, too, that while Harrison and Boyd certainly played into the Hippie/Psychedelic ideals by way of dress, they both reflected on their trip to Haight-Ashbury rather skeptically, confessing that they were mutually disappointed by the purportedly “Beautiful People” of the district who instead looked like “drop-outs, bums and spotty youths all out of their brains,” as Pattie shared in her memoir, Wonderful Tonight.
I’m particularly interested in this photograph because of its cultural implications as it relates to the rise of Psychedelia and Haight-Ashbury as a cultural epicenter and the sartorial shift of the Beatles (which functions also as a reflection of the collective sartorial shift that occurred during the sixties). I’ve written extensively about the early Beatles, with a particular focus on how their early sound was largely informed by Black America (it’s somewhat of a pipe dream of mine to one day write a book about this very subject). It’s interesting to consider how during the latter half of their career, they instead borrowed heavily from the East, both in the context of their sound and their visual style. Comparisons could even be made to the work of Poiret, whose work was imbued with orientalism, as well as Yves Saint Laurent, who borrowed heavily from non-Western cultures (consider, for example, his 1967 Africa collection). I have also written about revolutionary fashion in the context of menswear during the sixties (You Say You Want a (Style) Revolution), as well as the influence of the psychedelic rock band the Grateful Dead’s influence on contemporary fashion (Fashion is Dead: The Appropriation of Grateful Dead Iconography in Fashion). The 1960s is an era I am particularly fascinated by and fairly well versed in, and I wish to continue to explore this era and uncover new insights while examining it through a new (and explicit) lens.
Prospective Image #2:
The above photograph depicts Wallis Simpson wearing a gown designed by Schiaparelli in collaboration with surrealist Salvador Dali. The photograph was taken by Cecil Beaton in 1937 a Vogue feature that prefaced the American-born socialite’s marriage to Edward, Prince of Wales, a controversial union which engendered Edward’s decision to abdicate the throne. The shoot took place in the gardens of the Châteaux de Candé in France. The shoot itself was considerably romantic (a deliberate decision made by Beaton, who recognized that most photographs of Simpson were quite unflattering).
The choice of gown for this feature is an attestation of Simpson’s panache, as well as her impulse to use fashion as both a subliminal tool and weapon during a time at which she was invariably scrutinized by the press. The vibrant lobster illustration sprawled across the pelvic region is a motif that Dali regularly employed in his surrealist paintings and objects as an inherently sexual symbol. Despite the crude implications of the lobster, the dress still communicates a sense of beauty. Simpson once said, “I’m not a beautiful woman. I’m nothing to look at, so the only thing I can do is dress better than anyone else.”
The silhouette and fabrication of the dress also has an undeniably scandalous layer to it, which is fitting for a woman like Simpson, whose life was more or less mired in scandal. The gown features a sheer panel at the rib cage, which extends into a fuller, sheer A-line skirt. The erotic nature of the gown essentially defeated the PR-motivated purpose of the Vogue shoot.
I find this particular image interesting because it evokes several interesting narratives, most notably — Simpson’s use of fashion as a weapon and relationship between Schiaparelli and Simpson; the former being someone whose designs embraced the “ugly” or unconventional, and the latter being a woman who used fashion as a means to compensate for her self-described “ugliness.” It’s also interesting to consider the fact that this iconic dress was reimagined for Schiaparelli’s Spring/Summer 2017 collection, thanks to current creative director Bertrand Guyon. It’d be interesting to explore why this particular gown still bears relevance and why it might have been revived at this particular point in time.
I’ve been mesmerized by the work of Schiaparelli for quite some time now, but I fell head over proverbial heels in love with her after listening to a particularly insightful Schiaparelli-centered episode of my favorite podcast, Dressed: The History of Fashion. I realized that my fascination with Schiaparelli presumably stems from the fact that our aesthetics and interests are very much aligned. I have an abject fascination with the grotesque and absurd; a lot of my artwork during my formative years featured decaying faces and insects (long before I even understood the surrealist connotations of such imagery). I enjoy art and fashion that engenders discomfort and subverts expectations, and I think a lot of Schiaparelli’s work did just that. The lobster dress is certainly no exception.
