Mae West: Metropolitan

Illustrated with a large and lovely photo of MAE WEST — — dripping with diamonds — — is an intriguing article about a new exhibit on view at a major Fifth Avenue museum located in the movie queen's hometown, New York City.
• • According to fashion maven Lori Ettlinger Gross: The new exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum’s Costume Institute, “American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity,” examines the evolution of style in this country and the appreciation of the breeze-easy female. Replacing the cosseted woman with a spirited American paradigm trumpeted more than the exchange of a corset for a shift dress, however. It sparked an upheaval in social etiquette: Women of independent means began buying their own jewelry. Fashion may have rattled the cage for change, yet it was gems and precious metals that broke the chains of Europe.
• • Lori Ettlinger Gross adds: The years covered by the exhibition, 1890 to 1940, were arguably the most innovative in jewelry design. Venerable houses and ambitious designers vied for the necks of socialites and celebrities. Success and the wealth that follows create their own self-determination. Take Mae West, for example, who bought a casket’s worth of Beaux-Art jewels and transformed herself into Diamond Lil. ...
• • Lori Ettlinger Gross emphasizes: As the movies became the style blueprint for the American woman, the costume designers Adrian and Edith Head created fashion iconography. . . . But whether on camera or off, the jewels were often the stars’ own. ...
• • To continue reading her article, or to learn more about the exhibition, check the link below.
— — Excerpt: — —
• • Article: "The Bling Factor | ‘American Woman’ at the Met"
• • By: LORI ETTLINGER GROSS
• • Published by: The New York Times Magazine — — tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com
• • Published on: 11 May 2010
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• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West with Noah Beery • • 1932 • •
• • Feed — — http://feeds2.feedburner.com/MaeWest
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Mae West.