Issue link: https://www.balharbourdigital.com/i/44746
All ThatJazz The 1920s proved to be a heady time for fashion—with Coco Chanel and Christian Dior leading the stylish revolution. With the era's recent revival in fashion and film, Kate Betts revisits the roaring Twenties. W hen the pint-sized English actress Carey Mulligan ap- pears on screen playing Daisy Buchanan to Tobey Maguire's Nick Carraway and Leonardo DiCaprio's Jay Gatsby in Baz Luhrmann's upcoming adaptation of F.Scott Fitzgerald's classic jazz age romance she will be resplendent in the decade's signature flapper dresses and cloche hats. And if Luhrmann's talented wife Catherine Martin is responsible for the costumes, Mulligan's wardrobe will be perfectly turned out in period de- tail—the soft-focus pastel palette, Art Deco prints, and diamond baguettes galore. Chances are Mulligan's costumes will also be right in step with fashion. Call it synchronicity, but the best looks at recent runway shows and so- ciety parties have been suffused with1920s style. Fashion is always a re- flection of the larger cultural mood and this latest reincarnation of jazz age style might owe something to the uncertain global financial situation or the strange imbalance of a wobbly stock market and soaring financial gains on Wall Street. Whatever the similarities between 1925 and 2011, it's fair to say that the look of the moment has a muse in the footloose flapper. Kate Moss dubbed her recent wedding to The Kills rocker Jamie Hince as "rock and roll 1920s." Her gauzy beaded chiffon dress—designed by John Galliano—evoked the fragile costumes of Mia Farrow in the 1974 film interpretation of Fitzgerald's homage to the era. And for HBO's Boardwalk Empire series, set in 1920s Atlantic City, costume designer John Dunn meticulously reproduces the clothing styles of the roaring twenties. Actress Paz de La Huerta, who plays the former Ziegfield Follies dancer Lucy Danziger, exhibits flapper style best through her character's fur stoles, beaded cloche hats, shimmering dresses and bright red lips. What makes the 1920s so ripe for revival is the cultural and political transformation of the time. After all, it was a moment of great liberation, especially for women who could finally vote, smoke in public, and get an education. It was a turning point in fashion, too. Women bobbed their hair and wore boyish clothes instead of corsets. Coco Chanel had changed everything, pairing down the silhouette with her inventive use of jersey fabrics, eliminating fussy layers and drawing on the geometric simplicity of Art Deco style. She also introduced the suntanned look and tapped 48 BAL HARBOUR Coco Chanel was one of the first de- signers to eliminate fussy layers and draw on the geo- metric simplicity of Art Deco style. IMAGE FROM FLAMMARION'S "INTIMATE CHANEL"