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from the New York Post's June 9th fashion page
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on a different model
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I've started a fascinating quest to understand the Asian fetish that is going on in our modern, Western culture these days, and I seem to be finding examples at regular frequencies.
Just after I wrote the previous post, The Fetish of White Men: Asian Women, I found at the New York Post's online fashion page a wedding gown designed by Vera Wang as part of the "Bright Brides" slide show. The first image of the "purple" Vera Wang wedding dress shows a cropped version of the dress, to show off the elaborate bodice. The next page has a full-length shot of the dress, and color is muddier and greyer, and the chiffon that floats flimsily around the inner lining of the dress doesn't match with the more formal bodice.
I wondered if this was an original by Wang, or if she found "inspiration" for it elsewhere? Looking online, the dress is described as "charcoal-lilac" even in the NYP description, and is indeed much greyer than the very first bright lilac version on the NYP. The bright lilac is not produced anywhere else.
I started an image search for "lilac gown" and found that the designers at Marchesa had indeed a very similar dress in their evening gown collection. Their chiffon is more structured than Wang's, and the bodice, although not as pretty as the floral motif on Wang's, adds an interesting metallic effect.
But, on closer look at Wang's "pretty" floral motif, it is as disorganized as her chiffon, with no discernible pattern to the flowers. And the velvet ribbon around the upper waist is an odd addition.
Now, the question is: who designed it first? Who took inspiration from whom, if at all?
Wang's dress (wrongly dated as Spring 2010 in the NYP display) is from her Spring 2011 bridal collection. The Marchesa dress is from their Fall 2011 collection. Designer often work up to a year before they showcase their works, and there is no reason why the savvy Wang wouldn't have known about the Marchesa dress before it came out for public view. Of course, Fall comes after Spring,but there isn't that long of a time period between Fall and Spring for either party to influence one another.
I give Marchesa credit because this is the kind of work they are known for. Vera Wang's Spring 2011 bridal collection has only two dresses with elaborate, macarme style designs on the bodice. The Fall 2011 Marchesa Ready To Wear collection has at least ten.