CLOTHE LINE: If you’re interested in fashion and happen to be visiting Paris between now and the end of April, you shouldn’t miss a fascinating exhibition of crinolines in the Galliera fashion museum, a Renaissance-style palace which contains more than 100,000 items of clothing and accessories.
The most extraordinary aspect of the crinolines is not just their hooped constructions over which the skirt, then the corset or stomacher was laced, but the handspan waists of the women who wore them. The fabrics are beautiful – the mousselines, the silk moirés, the taffetas and the silks, the most dramatic dress a bold red and black striped affair that belonged to the Empress Eugenie, the Princess Di of her day. Some of the more wondrous pieces of jewellery, the tiaras, the brooches and the fans are incredibly elaborate, but one had to wonder from what did the little black lace umbrellas with their handcarved ivory or coral handles protect their wearers?
Galliera, 10 avenue Pierre 1er de Serbie, 75116, Paris, tel 00331-56528600.
