It is a widespread habit, that of turning up one’s nose at fashion. The eternal superficial one, the magpie greedy for gleams and feathers and colours, the ever-coquettish and foolish vanity of appearances that says nothing and changes nothing. How I would love to spoon-feed such comments back with the very broth of their own shallowness, forcing the judgmental thinker to swallow the bitter morsel of their ignorance. For costume does not lie. No, fashion is neither artefact nor artifice, neither pretension nor mere expression, but the most brutal and finely sharpened branch of psychology. And once again it is Marie Antoinette, the maligned Queen of France, who proves the precision of its mechanism, finding in her armoire the means of redemption. It is her garments, now displayed in Gallery 38 and 39 of the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, that stand beside the monumental paintings of Edward Burne-Jones, the landscapes of William Turner, or the faded hues of Constable, in the first long-awaited exhibition devoted to the now-acknowledged Queen of Style and to her influence on contemporary culture. Master of ceremonies and sponsor of the project is Manolo Blahnik, who on the night of 18th September 2025 gathered a kermesse of friends and the international press for the preview of the exhibition.
Here, my thought departs from a didactic account of artefacts to become the tale of a night at the museum flowing into historical re-enactment. At the entrance of the V&A, Mr. Blahnik embraces New York pamphleteer Fran Lebowitz, whom only three years earlier I had spotted strolling in Mayfair, too timid then to ask her a comment on the weather, and with whom, that evening, I shared dinner. Actor Richard Grant arrives in a checked suit, and I cannot help but think he remains the finest Dr. Seward of Stokerian cinema. Even before the festivities begin, I relish the champagne coupes: what a relief not to find those atrocious flutes that seem to have dethroned the marvellous crystal shaped on the breasts of Diane de Poitiers. To raise the first of many toasts is curator Sarah Grant, from whom I learn with astonishment that Manolo Blahnik’s bond with Marie Antoinette began in childhood, when his mother would read Stefan Zweig’s biography aloud as if it were a fairytale (the very thought is the acme of an intellectual elegance that ought to become, more than a trend, a custom). And thus I am ushered into the first gallery, where a projected portrait of the Dauphine is framed by a phrase from her mother, Maria Theresa of Austria: “All Eyes Will Be On You.” A presage that, 255 years later, still holds as destiny. The robe de cour once worn by Duchess Hedvig Elisabeth Charlotta, later Queen of Sweden, stirs general amazement for the narrow span of its hips, though at the time, for the sixteen-year-old bride, the corset was the trellis upon which she had shaped her youthful body. From foreign courts survive Robe à la Française in tulle and embroidered taffeta, Robe de Nuit, a chemise with hood; of her, remain silk slippers unbent by time, still so steady as to suggest a near-phantom presence nourished, as Zweig wrote, only by raspberries and the occasional crumb of meringue.
And while in the days that followed I read enthusiastic reviews of Chanel couture pieces by Karl Lagerfeld or of the wide selection of fans adorned with pastoral coiffure scenes, I recall that there, for the first time, I grasped the egocentrism of misery: yes, before the meagre prisoner’s jacket of the widow Capet, before her book of prayers with its final message dedicated to her children, and inhaling the odour — masterfully recreated — of human secretions, filth and anguish from her detention at the Conciergerie, I understood that suffering is craftier than joy. It leans upon compassion, upon empathy, but above all upon relief. For where joy engenders envy, anguish elicits pity, and binds you to itself without prejudice.
After a final farewell to the creations of Manolo Blahnik and Milena Canonero for Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette — a film of generational aesthetic definition deserving an essay of its own — the dinner revived the tradition of the banquet. A harpist plucked Greensleeves, followed by an ensemble inclined toward the lightness of Offenbach’s Barcarolle, as I spread salted butter roses over steaming Austrian bread. And although we are nearly certain that the iconic phrase “Let them eat cake” was never uttered (to avoid misunderstandings, I had it tattooed on my right arm years ago), the evening closed with Bow Wow Wow — already Coppola’s choice — while sugar swans floating on the table, accompanied by boats of vanilla cream, rose jellies and cornucopias of seasonal fruit (atop, a ruby-red pomegranate made me think of another guest of the museum, Rossetti’s The Day Dream, whose shades of green never fail to summon tears that threaten the composure required of a public visit, amidst a sea of people).
Returning to my hotel room, I reflected, as befits one of the trade. And in my reflection, history and present overlapped with such precision as to leave no room for doubt. Humanity remains an end in itself, bound in a unilateral relation with its own ineluctable nature that drives it ever to repeat the same mistakes, incapable of judging its present or learning from its past. Style changes, yet the garment remains, as remains the ability of a few to persist in defending luxury. The luxury of wasted time, of food savoured without counting calories, of wearing handmade shoes, of drinking just enough to feel cheerful, even as the live music has ended. In this, Manolo Blahnik and Marie Antoinette—who has inspired the designer’s capsule collection of models drawn from the film (needless to say, one pair had to be mine)—are alike, in having instilled into culture a fashion that extinguishes all logic, that highlights the futility of worry before the inevitable, and invites us to discover the dignity of dressing as mockery of fate, of defending identity against the brutalising tide of massification. Whether before a work of art or a pair of shoes, tasting a dessert or swallowing a medicine, in the ecstasy of love or in desperate weeping, to be truly and fully human one must always find a reason to lose our head.
