Old burlesque costumes, get ready to cry

eel

eel

Registered Guest
So I bought a trash bag of beaded "things" that had belonged to Gilda Gray. I was in a hurry and didn't go through it, until I got home. I also didn't research her until I got home either and regret not grabbing some of the paper stuff that had her name/signature on it. I actually left canceled checks and other stuff there :duh2:

anyway, the stuff is in BAD fragile shape. Don't think anything can be done about it without costing an arm and a leg, sigh

it seriously almost brought tears to my eyes to see this butterfly dress with the rips
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this one HAD a beaded skirt at one time
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this skirt top had feathers at one time
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This piece weighs a ton, all glass beading
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it even has a sparkly g-string style crotch
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metal thread and glass beaded collar
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various odds and ends, I WISH whatever came in that Cartier bag was still in there!
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and this POOR Lanvin cloche had blue iridescent feathers all over it at one time
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Hi,

It is sad they disintegrated so badly, but still just to see them is a treat, and they have value for study and research. I would love that butterfly dress just to display!

Actually, what are your plans for the badly damaged Lanvin hat? I do not know if this is the right forum to ask, but if you wish to part with it, I'd love it for the millinery museum, or just to loan for some photos?

Thank you for showing them.

Barbara
 
Good lord.

Some lovely beaded examples on show this week. Try to have the butterfly dress backed if possible. That's basically making a new slip as a lining and attaching the dress to it. I think it would be worth it for the provenance if you can still get the paperwork? That's really important. You can just see Gilda shimmy in those costumes. Great find.
 
Thanks everybody. Trust me I am kicking myself hard for not grabbing the brown bag of personal papers! I went to the seller the next day and he didn't have them (I think they may have been thrown out)
there were 3 or 4 huge scrap books she must have made, someone paid a bunch for those. Most of the lot of stuff was furniture and it was a frenzy of people snapping the stuff up! The only other clothes were somewhat modern crappy mens stuff. I'm guessing this was the estate of whoever inherrited her things.

I've done some searching on line for photos of these costumes and can't find a match. These do seem pretty risqué so I'm guessing there weren't photos of the entire show.

I really didn't know what I had until I pulled the pieces out at home. When I did you could hear beads and sparkles dropping, ugh! it took two if us to lift out the heavy dress

I would LOVE to save some of them, especially the butterfly dress. I was wondering if someone could back the fabric with something to make it stronger and wearable.
 
Hi,

I just wanted add in another thought. Someone asked about sending the Lanvin hat to a seamstress for renovation, but I have to strongly disagree. Millinery and dressmaking are not the same art, and no matter how good a seamstress she might be, she is not be able to restore an antique Haute Couture feather hat. As a matter of fact, an actual restoration of that hat would require knowing exactly what the hat looked like before the feathers completely fell off, and finding antique feathers of the same type and same age/vintage with which to do the restoration. Applying new feathers would be just wrong on so many levels. I am not a museum curator, but would think that the hat would be better off left as is, and sent/donated/sold to a museum to restore.

It takes and entire semester at FIT or FIDM to learn to create feather hats, so it is not an easy task or something left to an uneducated hand. I would leave it as it is, and attempt to find a clear close up photo of the hat or a description in the Lanvin archives.

Just my 2 cents...

Barbara
 
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