Tuesday, November 24, 2009

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Sunday, November 8, 2009

The Most Beautiful Girl In The Mid-West



Cathleen ni Houlihan, one of the symbols of Irish nationhood, is often depicted in literature as an old woman who needs the help of young men to fight for Ireland. She is not usually as beautiful as Hazel Lavery appears on the old Irish pound note.

Born Hazel Martyn in Chicago in 1880, she was the daughter of a wealthy American industrialist descended from an old Irish family. Hazel was a talented young artist and ambitious, but fate had other plans.

The ‘most beautiful girl in the Mid-West’ fell in love with the Irish artist, John Lavery, on a family holiday in Brittany, when she was quite young. The widower was thirty years older and Hazel’s family was not impressed with the match. Hazel agreed to marry Ned Trudeau, a handsome surgeon, who was her family’s choice.

Ned died of pneumonia a short time after they were married when Hazel was pregnant with Alice. Hazel wanted to return to John but her mother still opposed the idea.

After her mother died Hazel was free. She married John in 1910.

John Lavery was a very successful artist who painted Queen Victoria, the Asquiths, the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova, and other famous people in society. He also painted many exquisite paintings of his wife, Hazel. He was knighted in 1921 so Hazel became Lady Lavery. (I can’t help receiving the impression that she was the type of woman who’d enjoy having a title!)

The Laverys were friendly with the Churchills. After the Dardanelles Campaign in 1915, Churchill’s wife, Clementine, thought that Winston would ‘die of grief.’ He had always wanted to paint and bought a paintbox and brushes. One day when he visited Hazel, she asked: “Why do you hesitate?” She persuaded him to finally start painting.

Hazel and John also helped Winston Churchill by becoming involved in diplomacy. Hazel became extremely interested in Irish nationalism – she even described herself as Irish and put on an Irish accent. She and John offered their house in South Kensington, London, as the site for the negotiations for the Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1922 which formed the basis for the Irish Free State.

Legend has it that forty year old Hazel fell for the handsome Irish nationalist, Michael Collins, and that they had an affair. She and John apparently had a rocky marriage. Michael wrote poems about her ‘delicate sad grace.’ However, Michael Collins was engaged to a young lady and Hazel was twenty years older and dyed her hair, according to one of Churchill’s daughters. There are claims that Hazel would have been shot by the I.R.A. if they’d had an affair.

There are also stories that Hazel wanted to put on widow’s weeds after Collins was shot and even throw herself onto his grave, but this is probably an exaggeration.

It’s a pity that Hazel’s talent for painting has largely been unnoticed. Perhaps her husband was the more talented of the two. Hazel died in 1935 and is buried with John in Putney Vale Cemetery.

(I hope to write about Sir John Lavery soon. They were certainly a fascinating couple!)

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Exhibition at the Lady Lever Art Gallery

If only I could go to this! This is an interesting article about the exhibition:
New Exhibition at the Lady Lever Art Gallery

I hope to write a longer post about a different subject soon.

Saturday, October 17, 2009

New York's Grande Dame

Brooke Astor would probably have been horrified by the trial and conviction of her son, Phillip Marshall, for grand larceny and other charges relating to his abuse of her. However, he obviously made her last years very unpleasant and thoroughly deserves time in jail.

Here is my article about her: New Yorks' Grande Dame

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Fashion in Film Link

Here is a site with beautiful photos and excellent descriptions of costumes from historical films: Fashion in Films at Winterthur. There are also audio-clips about the designs. I listened to one but I found it very short and disappointing.

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Paul Iribe


Paul Iribe was a famous fashion illustrator, designer and graphic artist. He was one of the founders of the art deco movement.

Born in 1883 in Angeloume, Iribe studied at the prestigious Ecole des Beaux-Arts and the College Rollin. He became an apprentice printer at the newspaper, Le Temps.

In 1908 the great fashion designer, Paul Poiret, 'discovered' Iribe. He admired Iribe's use of the pochoir technique, which involved colours brushed onto paper by using stencils. The technique featured bright colours and simple, sharp lines.

Iribe produced Les Robes des Poiret to advertise Poiret's new fashions. Only 250 were printed and each were signed and numbered. This was a great advance in fashion illustration because of the pochoir technique and the very modern poses of the models. They didn't just stand in unnatural poses. These models talked, played the piano, and generally enjoyed life in relaxed arrangements.

Iribe also designed wallpaper, fabrics, furniture, and helped Chanel with her jewellery designs.

He went to Hollywood in 1914 where he designed costumes and interiors for Paramount studios. His designs were used in many of Cecil B.DeMille's epics, including The Ten Commandments.

Iribe eventually returned to France where he continued his design work and set up a political newspaper. Chanel fell for the wonderfully talented fashion illustrator and caused him to separate from his second wife, Marybelle Hogan, an American heiress. He and Chanel were engaged when he died of a heart attack while playing tennis. Coco Chanel was devastated.

Iribe was only 52.

Sunday, September 6, 2009

Edwardian Twitter?

Apparently the Edwardians had their own version of Twitter, according to this article: Edwardians used 'Twitter' Speak

I hope to write a longer post soon.