lazy sunday afternoons can be taken up by a whole manner of things, be them crossword-doing, baking, painting toe-nails, arranging flowers and those sorts of activities; not tiresome but by no means stressful either. The day of rest should be occupied by things that are, either by nature or by consequential actions, restful. That is why on sunday afternoons i like to flip through magazines and involve myself in some healthy daydreaming. This sunday, with golden globe in my not too distant memory and oscar looming like a big iceberg ahead, i would like to share some of my favourite dresses.
Some i like because of the fashion moment it represented, some i like as a combination of the person and the dress together, some i like because they capture a moment in time that i find endearing and adorable, and some i like because they are just so damn fabulous.
Marion Cotillard, Oscars 2008, Jean Paul Gaultier
[tfs]I love this dress an incredible, awful lot. When she stepped foot onto that red carpet i squealed with glee, mostly because all of the other actresses had been in nude, strapless, grecian style dresses which are lovely when you can get it, and of course one of those will appear later on in the list, but at the end of the day you want to wow, not bore. Marion, exploding into the lounge rooms of people across the world, a virtual unknown, made a statement with this dramatic and daring haute couture dress with fish scale pattern. It was tight, glitzy and figure-showing, everything that oscars loves, as well as being chic, fashion-y and all around fabulous, which the public in general loves. ALthough she got mixed reviews, i love love loved it, and can't wait to see more of her, and her fashion choices, at the oscars to come.
Cameron Diaz, Oscars 2008, stella mccartney (?)
[cameron diaz fan]I am a sucker for quirky, different tailoring and draping. So it is no wonder that this simple strapless fish tail number in palest pink is one of my favourites when you consider the tucks and folds along the bodice. Cameron diaz consistently, and i mean consistently, comes up with the goods at awards shows. i don't even like her personal style, or even her personality, but at awards shows she is one of the only young actresses who manages to ensure that she stays true to herself, that is, natural beauty and no-fuss glamour, which seems like an oxymoron i know. I loved that year she came in the kimono dress with big turquoise jewellery, and also the year that everyone hated her globes dress that was frilly, frou frou and white tulle by chanel. I love it all. She is a tour de force, rivalled only by our next favourite:
Cate Blanchett, Golden Globes 2004, (?)
[tfs]I love Cate Blanchett, i think she is a goddess sent down from heaven to mingle with the commoners. Only Goddesses have skin that perfect, minds that intelligent, faces that beautiful, and the ability to act so amazingly well. She can't be human. This is one of my favourite award show dresses of hers, and she's even pregnant here, and looking better than i ever could. I don't even like satin! i think it's unforgiving and harsh against anyone that isnt a size 0, and look how she makes it look: Radiant (she is actually glowing!). Confident. Born to take a chance (thankyou Anastasia). The cap sleeves are so cute, but made elegant by the draping and the tucks along the neckline, and then its just a free fall down to that lovely train. So Stunning. it takes my breath away, seriously.
speaking of people who consistently get it right...
Charlize Theron, Oscars 2005, ??
[charlize theron fan]I could have chosen anything she has ever worn to an awards show, including that infamous tangerine dress in 2o00 that showcased her.... wits... She is incredible when it comes to awards show dressing, and geting that exact balance of elegance and sophistication as well as cool and personal style. The year she won the best actress oscar (2004) she paraded around a series of incredible dresses on the circuit, culminating in that skin tight, glittery, slinky armani prive (who else?) number in which she took home the statue. but no, that is not the dress i chose. Instead there is this fabulous, drool-worthy, heart attack inducing strapless number in the palest of blues in the lightest of silk chiffon and tulles (i'm a sucker for some tulle, can you tell?) with a huge train (also a sucker for the train, is it obvious?), and tiers. She was the beautiful barbie doll that everyone wanted to be, stunning make up, fabulous jewellery, jaw-droppingly amazing dress.
Amy Adams, Oscars 2008, Proenza Schouler
[amy adams fan]Amy Adams was born to wear green. No-one else can touch that colour. It is hers. Forever. the proenza boys are some of my favourites for the really tailored, fitted look in womens clothing, especially their dresses, and this is no exception. I like the belt at the waist, the darts and exposed seams that run all along the bodice and skirt until the attached fishtail hem. I also love the proenza signature neckline, that sees a raised and exaggerated 'cup' over each boob and an adjoining neckline/bar in between. Adams looked every inch the modern day old hollywood starlet that she is.
Sofia Coppola, Oscars 2004, ??
[tfs]I love Sofia Coppola. I love the fact that she is shacked up with her boyfriend and child in paris living my dream of romance and movies and fabulousness in the best city in the world. I love that she's so witty and clever and makes intelligent art-house movies for young people. I love her take on the decadence of versailles, and seem to be one of the only people who has read antonia fraser's biography and seen the film and loved the both of them. I love this dress. Love it. LOVE IT. the ties at the shoulders are charming. The slinkiness of it all is sexy. The panelling around the hips is interesting. The waist cincher gives it shape. The colour is just divine against her skin tone.... that wine silk is just so incredibly beautiful it makes me want to cry. Really.
Drew Barrymore, Golden Globes 2007, ??
[drew barrymore online]the ubiquitous, required strapless grecian dress in a pale colour. But this dress represents more than that to me because it was drew's moment of triumph after all the hate she copped the year before for that green dress that did not flatter her at all. She put her hair up in a messy, ruffled bun with plaits (very cute, couldn't find a picture of the back), applied some shimmery glowing make up, took hugh grant as her date, and generally wowed the fashion press. She looked so radiant and happy, and i suppose for me this dress is not so much chosen because it is so fabulous, or ground-breaking, or elegant, or sophisticated, i suppose in one way or another it is all of those things, but rather because of the moment it signified for drew, who although is a bit silly i have a soft spot for. I have a lot of time for drew. :)
Michelle Williams, Oscars 2006, Vera Wang
[i am fashion blog]Ladies and Gentleman: this is how to wear yellow. I couldn't find a better pic than this, but by god did she look good. Her hair was gorgeously messy, her red limps vampy and old-hollywood, and her dress was knock out. There are not many actresses who will risk wearing yellow on the red carpet, it has the rather annoying habit of washing one out, cate blanchett wore it in 2005 when she won best supporting actress, and looked fab indeed, but many ahve tried (and failed) to wear it well. Michelle didn't go for the dicky lemony yellows that some choose in the hope it will seem like white, but dived straight in with this bright, bold and statement-making yellow that said, here i am, look at me. She was relatively unknown, a beauty, sure, but paling in comparison to the success of the fellow dawsons creek alumnae (in particular katie holmes, who had just shacked up with crazy tom if memory serves me correctly). This dress was one of the those wake up calls, like a reminder to the world of how beautiful and stunning, inside and out, she really is. Look at me. I'm a star. (RIP heath)
Keira Knightley, Oscars 2006, Vera Wang
[keira knightley org]This is the type of dress that you remember. I'm all for understated elegance and classic sophistication, yes that works if you're presenting, or trying to fly under the radar and just make a best dressed list. BUt if you are up for nomination, and you even have the slightest chance of winning, you hedge your bets and you wear a dress that, in the event of you getting up onto that podium, people will remember. That's why i want Kate Winslet to wear something bright and bold this coming february. That's why i was disappointed nicole kidman wore boring black in boring cut when she won. That's why i was thrilled to pieces when reese witherspoon wore that vintage christian door with hand-appliqued sequins. And that's why Keira Knightley did the right thing in this Vera Wang. It was THE dress, besides Michelle's, of the show, the one that everyone had on their lips long past the opening of the envelopes. Her fierce facial expression (har har), her crazily extravagant but really cool jewellery, and that firecracker of a dress in the most bizarre of fabrics but in such an interesting cut and draping that it doesn't matter, meant that the gorgeous brit, but really only known for pirates of the caribbean, become the newest it-starlet, which surely threw many a delicious role her way. It's all about the dress.
Penelope Cruz, Oscars 2008, Valentino
[penelope fan]Penelope Cruz is gorgeous, like stunningly gorgeous, and once i got over the fact she was tom cruise's ex (eurghhh) i realised she was actually a great actress with a real eye for awards fashion. In 2007 when she was nominated for volver she did the rounds in the classic staples of award show dresses: lots of tulle, lots of layers, lots of frou, lots of big big bling. Her oscars dress was most notable, and in the style of keira knightley, dressing to remember, a tight, fitted bodice erupting in ruffles down the skirt into a huge train. Unforgettable. I prefer, however, this more subdued number from last year. Yes, it may be in black, but there is something so interesting and intriguing about this dress that combines chiffon, feathers, draping and strapless without being too busy. And i love the way that it is draped all around her stomach area, drawing attention to somewhere one would not usually try to draw attention to, and she still looks classy and chic. Perhaps it helps that she's a goddess.
Julianne Moore, Oscars 2003, Yves Saint Laurent.
[julianne moore online]When i said that Amy Adams was born to wear green, i probably should have mentioned that she has a green twin sister in Julianne Moore. Both of them have that same colouring; the pale porcelain skin, the glorious ginger locks (i've always wanted red hair!), the piercing green eyes. When she wore this dress she upstaged everyone on the red carpet, including fellow nominee nicole kidman, and everyone was wondering why julianne wasn't nominated in best actress category instead.... So slinky, so sexy, so amazingly incredible... And the ruffles down the front! they seemed to just pool down in a puddle of green jersey around her well-heeled feet.
Diane Kruger, Oscars 2007, Elie Saab
[tfs]One way to grab the attention of the cinematic industry is to be that year's unknown but stunning blonde. You know, there's one of them every year, and sometimes she has brown hair, but most of the time she is a blonde beautiful but unknown actress attached to a man/film that is doing well. in 2003 it was scarlett johanson. in 2000 it was charlize theron. in 2004 it was naomi watts. In 2007 it was Diane Kruger, hitherto seen by american audiences in well, troy. and then, well, national treasure. you get the point though. Not the world's greatest actress, but almost offensively beautiful, and very stylish, so really it doesn't matter all that much. so in elie saab, delicate, pretty and ethereal diana shines.
Maggie Gyllenhaal, Oscars 20o6, Bottega Veneta
[maggie fan]As you may have noticed, 2006 was a good year for oscars fashion in my opinion. Maggie, however, represents a very different kind of dress to almost everything that i've shown here. Maggie is, as i have noted before, that gem of an actress whose personal style is as quirky but un-pretentious and un-forced as her own personality. In fact, it seems more apt to say that her personality just shines out through her clothes. She never wears anything that jars with her person, and she never seems fake in her dress choices. Sometimes you find actresses that clearly feel at odds with the dress: too formal, too old, too young (ugh), too short, too fashion-y... Maggie always gets it right. This dress, which was hated by most that year, was a real love of mine, in fact, i wanted to get it copied for the dress i wore to my aunt's wedding later that year, of course, my mother intervened, what with it being totally backless (hahahaha). The thing i love about this dress is first of all, it seems to be made from some kind of stiff material, perhaps wool jersey or calico blend, which is such a departure from all the satin and silk and softness that pervades the red carpet these days. Second of all: the pockets. How cute, and how lovely. And third of all i love the colour. Brown. who would have known? We all know Maggie Gyllenhaal is fashionable, but this dress shows that she is also undeniably beautiful in the same quirky way that she dresses.
*sigh*. all these beautiful dresses! all these beautiful people!
how terribly mitford.
i want to go to the oscars!
can i be attached to a lovely and dashing actor, brilliant too of course, pretty please, poste-haste.
ah *sigh sigh sigh*.
sunday afternoons should always be spent dreaming and wishing.
to rose-lipped maidens and light foot lads....
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