Maarja-Liis' shoes

Maarja-Liis Ilus, 90s Estonian pop star, Tallinn

Marques Almeida, SS 2012, London

Catherine's décolleté

I decided to write a post about décolletés after a visit to the Peter the Great's House Museum Tallinn. There they had this unusually lively museum guard who gifted us with a lot of juicy historic gossip and one memorable thought went like this:

Women of the 18th century had very deep décollettés that reached almost down to the nipples, because it was extremely hot in the ballrooms, because it was lit with hundreds of candles, which meant that the party ended as soon as the candles were finished, because they couldn't replace all the candles so quickly.

What a beautiful thread of practicalities, even though it is obvious the whole outfit Catherine is wearing is working against her in that hot ballroom – deep décolleté or not. This is also why I'm fascinated with stories that the so-called history comes up with. Rationalizations that seem to work from one angle but completely dissolve from another point of view.

Katariina I dekoltee, 18. saj.

What is more exciting about deep décolletés is not when women wear them cause those reasons are pretty obvious but the implications of it in men's fashion. I'm not sure if this trend has died out a bit since ca 2008 because I've moved more north, to the land of conservative tastes, but there was definitely a wave of the deep V-neck. A big favor of American Apparel that raised some questions and doubts whether this is 'so edgy you don't get it' or 'so girly but I can't see it'. At least we know what side Yeezy is on.

An important man from earlier times with a strong liking to a wide décolleté was Francis I of France. It was a rather brief trend in men's fashion in the beginning of 16th century, right before the shirt under it was drawn tight with a string and became a ruff collar instead.