Editors’ note: Kyla actually wrote this with the rest of her criticism back when it was, ahem, more relevant, but we split it into two posts and forgot about posting the second half until now.
Election Night
The most puzzling of all Michelle Obama’s clothes is her election night dress, which looks so off because it’s a Narciso Rodriquez runway dress that was modified to remove the sheerness in the skirt and straps and make it more soccer-mom friendly with broader straps, a modest neckline (Ms Obama almost never shows even a hint of cleavage, except in formal wear), and a longer A-line bottom. The neckline no longer echoes the ‘V’ of the bodice or contains any edge whatsoever.
It looks like it was chosen to try and make her look 20 lbs skinnier with the black bars on the sides (also broadened so they cover more), and the V’s of red created by the ribbon bodice thing attempt to force an hourglass. It’s an obvious attempt to create a body that’s not hers, and the forced modesty completely destroys the style of the dress, including the fussy out-of-place cardigan she put over it.
Inauguration Day
The colour was nice: an unusual, peppy yellow-green. That, coupled with the green gloves, are really the only things I liked about that outfit. The National Post linked to this pic of Pat Nixon:
And yeah. That really says it all. The dress was very conservative and “typical First Lady” for a woman who has never dressed First Lady but, as I said in my last post, prefers One Of The People. It looked like an awkward costume, made all the more awkward by the attempts to make it different, which fell flat. While I liked that she played with silhouette with the long coat and shorter skirt, the long, loosely-closed and flapping coat looked more like a housecoat. It was bad enough when I thought she put yet another cardigan under it, but then I heard those were panels sewn onto the front of the dress. Eww. And she should have gone with dark green or brown shoes, not medium green. And could have done without the white sheer pantyhose. Not to mention, she looked cold.
Inauguration Ball
Michelle, stop raiding the Whitehouse closets; it’s unbecoming:
Actually, Nancy did it better: it’s white and one-shouldered, but aside from the subtle patterning, it’s simple and clean. Michelle’s was all over the place. It had pleats, gathers, fabric petals, beads, a train, and asymmetry. Two, Michelle, choose two of those things then let the rest go. She’s tall and not overly thin, so she has presence automatically. That much going on is just a wall of stuff. Someone suggested that it was just a bad gown for TV, since you couldn’t really see the details and it just looked like cotton balls. I agree, I bet it looked better in person. That doesn’t make it suck any less when it’s on TV.
