A Largely Ignored Fashion Phenomenon...

DAHLINGS -

Forgive my long absence. I have been simply swamped by houseguests at my fabulous (featured in Architectural Digest) oceanfront mansion! The rain on Monday meant everyone was trapped inside the house, which, magnificent though it is, can feel a tad claustrophobic when you have twelve fashion movers and shakers with nothing to do but drink Cape Cods and argue about what exactly constitutes a maxi-dress.

I checked over on (ugh) Ebay, to find a heated debate about a lovely 1950s Anne Kaufmann dress, and one seller commented at length. She/he/it said it was a "skinny girl dress," and ah, that brought back memories! So I thought I would do a little Internet digging and give you the straight skinny, pardon the execrable pun.

Skinny Girl Dresses were a largely ignored though widespread fashion phenomenon. Expressly made for Audrey Hepburn impersonators, they combined fashion with comfort, as the clacking of all of those fragile bones made for distracting noise when a Skinny Girl walked down the street. The wide scoop necklines revealed bony clavicles, while the full skirts concealed both the knobby knees or the more unfortunate "thick leg syndrome" which afflicted roughly one in 200 Skinny Girls.

There is a website, SKG dot com, which always says "under construction" but if you click the almost invisible wisp of gray against the white background (a symbol of Skinny Girlhood) it will take you into the site.

However, the site can accurately guess your body mass index by the touch of your hands on the keyboard, so if it's more than 0.01% body fat you will be locked out.

Back to my guests..."Mad Men" is over and they're back to arguing whether or not the leading man's haircut is authentic enough.

Ciao,
Elisa & Bucky the Wonderdog