Diana Vreeland - On Ballet

 "For years I was in ballet schools. I never went with the idea of becoming a professional. At a certain point I couldn’t really go to a regular school because I didn’t know anything, and ballet school was the only school my parents could keep me in. I was perfectly happy in a ballet class on a barre. I think that it’s the only way to bring up a girl, you see, because it gives her a feeling, a rhythm. Through dancing you interpret the music, and you feel the wonderful, natural things of the earth. It’s the discipline, doing everything absolutely perfectly, meeting the standards because, by God, with a ballet master like Fokine, if you didn’t you were in trouble."  Diana Vreeland

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Diana Vreeland - On working

 "Before I went to work, my life was a life of leisure. I’d no responsibilities except my house, my family, and my friends. I could never have lived that kind of life in New York. I think it’s something in the climate that makes one want to get out and about. To me, people live in New York to work, not to dream or to have a leisurely, imaginative life. There’s too much interference, and there are too few people who can join you in leisure. There’s great imagination here, but it’s of another kind."  Diana Vreeland

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Diana Vreeland - On Fashion

"Fashion is not the same thing as style. Fashion is everywhere, on the daily air, and it’s always moving."  Diana Vreeland 

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Diana Vreeland - On Money

"Money has nothing to do with style at all, but naturally it helps every situation. You need money to eat and sleep and look properly, to have a good life. Of course, people have grown up from under a stone and have come up with plenty of style. We’re all born to have it, we just need to get on to our own thing."  Diana Vreeland

 The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 oral biographies from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Diana Vreeland - On Style

"I think style is a totally natural thing. One has standards and through concentration maintains them, that’s all it is. It’s a normal rhythm which covers everything. There’s nothing difficult about anything that is innate. Style is a wonderful thing to have because it maintains you through the way you behave, the literature you read, your life with friends, with children and with your family. Style is always growing and changing, always finding new outlets and interests, of course, particularly through work. I can’t imagine anything more onerous than not having a regular standard, a rhythm, a behavior, and a work."  Diana Vreeland 

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.  One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Diana Vreeland - On Ballet

"My education was rather spotty because my parents were very careless. They always forgot when it was fall and time for little girls to go to school, but then when they remembered they sent us. For years I was in ballet schools. I never went with the idea of becoming a professional. At a certain point I couldn’t really go to a regular school because I didn’t know anything, and ballet school was the only school my parents could keep me in. I was perfectly happy in a ballet class on a barre. I think that it’s the only way to bring up a girl, you see, because it gives her a feeling, a rhythm. Through dancing you interpret the music, and you feel the wonderful, natural things of the earth. It’s the discipline, doing everything absolutely perfectly, meeting the standards because, by God, with a ballet master like Fokine, if you didn’t you were in trouble.."

– Diana Vreeland, from 'Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times', by Lynn Gilbert.

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art. One of 42 profiles from 'Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.'

Particular Passions is available on Amazon on Apple. 

Diana Vreeland – On Style

"Money has nothing to do with style at all, but naturally it helps every situation. You need money to eat and sleep and look properly, to have a good life. Of course, people have grown up from under a stone and have come up with plenty of style. We’re all born to have it, we just need to get on to our own thing."

– Diana Vreeland, from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times, by Lynn Gilbert.

Diana Vreeland's oral biography from the late 1970s is one of 42 compelling stories captured in 'Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times', by Lynn Gilbert.

Particular Passions is available on Apple and Amazon.

Diana Vreeland – On Style

"I THINK STYLE IS A totally natural thing. One has standards and through concentration maintains them, that’s all it is. It’s a normal rhythm which covers everything. There’s nothing difficult about anything that is innate. Style is a wonderful thing to have because it maintains you through the way you behave, the literature you read, your life with friends, with children and with your family. Style is always growing and changing, always finding new outlets and interests, of course, particularly through work. I can’t imagine anything more onerous than not having a regular standard, a rhythm, a behavior, and a work."

– Diana Vreeland, from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times, by Lynn Gilbert.

The oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art. One of 42 profiles from Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Shaped Our Times.

Particular Passions is available on Amazon and Apple. 

FASHION WEEK – THAT MOST GRATIFYING ADDICTION

“When I start a show, I’m very timid and nervous for weeks and months… You start with an idea and you believe in it... Some days are big days. You jump. You get a whole excitable, marvelous… wonderful it-doesn’t-balance, what-the-hell-are we going-to-do feeling.” –Diana Vreeland, in "Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Have Shaped our Times"  talking about her exhibitions for the Costume Institute that she established at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Fashion comes down through an attenuated twisting funnel propelled by an idea that has been percolating in the “air.” Fashion takes shape through multiple paths at the hands of designers and stylists. Buyers and the media determine what the public sees.  Throw in a dollop of some celebrity wearing a particular style and history is in the making. But ultimately the judge is the buying public. To be a part of the lexicon of style that goes down through the ages, it’s the vision of a woman like Diana Vreeland who picked, promoted and established what was worthy of being remembered with stunning blockbuster exhibits at the Met.  

Who can determine whether the shoe in the photograph will “endure.” It should, just because this "look" will go out of style faster than it came in. After resting in a closet for 40 years these shoes will “endure” because they’ll still be new.

Could the style-maker Diana Vreeland make a fashion like these shoes “stick?” Read a brief chapter, the oral biography Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at The Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.

Available at Amazon and Apple.

Shoes like these probably cost a mint while the chapter is only $0.99. Enjoy, it's fun reading just like the shoes are fun to admire.

NEW YORK CITY FASHION WEEK VERSUS TIMELESS ELEGANCE

"Style is a wonderful thing to have because it maintains you through the way you behave, the literature you read, your life with friends, with children and with your family. Style is always growing and changing..."

— Diana Vreeland in  "Particular Passions: Talks with Women who Shaped our Times"

Embroidered velvet coat, Marshall & Snelgrove Ltd (retailers), 1895-1900, via Victoria and Albert Museum

The coat above, represents some of the types of clothes from another era that Diana Vreeland brought to the attention of the audience at the Met.

Read a brief chapter, an oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose seminal exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to fine art, a bite sized "taste" of  an inspiring book. Better yet, buy the complete book of 46 women who opened doors for women in many disciplines around the world. It is available at Amazon and Apple. Chapters are $0.99, the book $7.95. It's a bargain.

As one reviewer said of the book - "One of those rare, rare books that pick your life up, turn it around and point it in the right direction." — K.T. Maclay.

Fashion Week brings buyers flocking from all over the country to see what fashions are next on the horizon.   But we all know that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and it's not necessarily what is new that is more beautiful. The old and timeless can be equally exciting. At least in the arena of fashion we can be a tolerant society and recoginize there is room for both points of view.

I think I'm somewhat of the old school, because what was fashionable or beautiful fades quickly as new styles and trends rapidly replace each other. They quicken the heart of the potential buyer who sees "a must have" and keeps the economy running at a clip. There are designs though, that transcend time. The coat above, is one of them. I hope you enjoy the timeless and subtle elegance of this regal design from an earlier century.

If you enjoy these blogs, I have no doubt you will enjoy the book.  It's chock full of wonderful stories, history, inspiring tales. Try it, you wont be disappointed.