This is the first of a two-part interview with Justine Picardie, the distinguished British biographer, novelist, and fashion historian.
Justine talks to Judy about her new book, Fashioning the Crown, a study of British royal fashion in the twentieth century. While the sartorial choices of Wallis Simpson (‘you can never be too rich or too thin’), including the notorious Lobster Dress designed by Schiaparelli with Salvador Dali, were so provocative and newsworthy, it was Queen Elizabeth (wife of George VI, later known as Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother), whom Hitler was said to have labelled “the most dangerous woman in Europe” after she wore white - the colour of freedom - on a visit to France in 1938, immediately before the war began.
This first episode examines how the sartorial choices of the House of Windsor projected power against the backdrop of two world wars and the abdication crisis, and contributed to a national re-evaluation of the legitimacy of the sovereign, and the family more generally, at the apex of the constitutional order of the United Kingdom.
Show Notes
Instagram @justinepicardie
Justine Picardie’s books include:
Fashioning the Crown: A Story of Power, Conflict and Couture
Miss Dior: A Wartime Story of Courage and Couture
Coco Chanel: The Legend and The Life
If The Spirit Moves You: Life and Love After Death
My Mother’s Wedding Dress
// Hosted by Judy Stewart
// Produced by Caroline Hughes for Feast Collective
// Sound Engineer: Jason Millhouse
// Instagram: @_unpaused // Website: www.unpaused.net
