Some of these were more successful than others, but the truth of the matter is that all of them put forth a valiant effort and not one of them looks flat out bad. In fact, I’d argue that Linda Cardellini — who I loathed on Mad Men this season, and not only because she looked consistently awful — looks great. The rest? You weigh in.
[Photos: Getty]
Also known as, A Selection of Pretty Things We Wear In Our Fantasy World Where We Do Glamorous Things. (Also, items you were certainly see on a celeb eventualy.)
[Photos: Getty]
So, there is acreage between “catering to your dramatic whims” and “looking like a crazypants naked and/or upholstered crackpot,” and the whole point of the Met Ball is the former, even if you fall on your face doing it (which leads to the latter, and outfits like that are exactly why Anna’s annual gala is such a hilarious good time and must never, ever change, even when we get capsy over people’s insane choices). Don’t we think it’s about time, say, Renee Zellweger had some semblance of a dramatic whim again? She is operating at a severe dramatic whimsy deficit. Her last one was Kenny Chesney, I think, and although that didn’t turn out so well for her, it was a VERY exciting time for all of us looky-loos. ALWAYS THINK OF THE LOOKY-LOOS. If we’re stuck with a stupid term like that to describe what we’re doing, then at least please make sure we’re having fun doing it.
[Photos: Getty]
This Marchesa is the one that a little girl sitting next to us at Fashion Week SQUEALED over during the show. And in fact, when we wrote up that show, I said ,”I would love for someone to wear this to an awards show, just… to DO it.” So THANK YOU, Bingbing. You have fulfilled a lot of people’s inner-girl dreams.
[Photos: Getty]
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Fug or Fab: Blake Lively
I love this dress; the question for me is the deployment thereof.
Blake Lively held about 25 percent true to the runway styling. Let’s break it down:
1) Hair: Slicked updo on the runway; easy waves on Blake. As much as Blake’s hair is her signature, the outfit is too twee on her with it draping all over her shoulders like that, so she should have removed her hair and mailed it to me so that I could wear it as my own. Failing that, I wish she’d done either a sleek or a soft updo — it would’ve made this just as romantic on her, but also more mature. Runway 1, Blake 0.
2) Lipstick: Both ladies matched it to the necklace. The fact that the necklace looks like a different color here, then, suggests an issue with the lighting, so it’s hard to judge. DAMN YOU, LIGHT. No points; still Runway 1, Blake 0.
3) Necklace: My instinct was that ALL of this jewelry was too over-the-top for the gown, but the addition of earrings on runway look pushes this over the top in a volcanic-lava kind of way: a sight to behold, but don’t try it at home. Alone, though, necklace seems like a random, cheap, costumey touch. At least the ginormous earrings with it suggests a deliberate trick. Thus, had I been Blake, I’d have styled this with totally different statement earrings (with my now-up hair) and no necklace at all. But she didn’t do that, so I’m going to give it to the runway. That’s Runway 2, Blake 0.
4) Shoes: Both pairs are upsetting. The runway pair is somewhat canklifying and looks like sex-torture ankle cuffs, and WHY did spell-check not freak out at “canklifying” when it’s yelling at me about “updo”? Wow. Anyway, Blake went off the grid with pointy-toed nude pumps that are totally the wrong shade for this outfit and can only have been selected because they match her level of foot-bronzer startlingly well. For not wearing the runway shoes, I give Blake a point, but for picking these instead she loses it, so that remains Runway 2, Blake 0.
5) Attitude: That model is GIVING IT. Her facial expression suggests that despite the girlish bouquet that is her giant tea cosy of a gown — gorgeous though I think it is — she herself is the kind of total sasspot who drizzles it with large costume jewelry and shoes that hook to a swing in her apartment. Blake just seems like she wants to know when the Easter egg hunt starts. Great if she were Kiernan Shipka and this was on the White House lawn, but she’s not, and it isn’t.
And so, to me, the runway version wins. But you should vote on whether you’d have bothered in the first place:
[Photo: WENN]
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