WEDDING FLOWERS: Ascot
News Update
Loading...
Showing posts with label Ascot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ascot. Show all posts
Royal Fashion Awards: Royal Ascot 2015, Days 4 & 5

Royal Fashion Awards: Royal Ascot 2015, Days 4 & 5

Comment   
The last two days of Royal Ascot did taper off in terms of royal attendance, but they also gave us the most Ascot-y of our royal Ascot hats this year, so it's a trade off. Let's finish this party up: 

Best in Coordination
The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh (Day 5)
Check that tie-to-outfit coordination. Not too matchy-matchy, just right. Awww. (You can of course see Her Maj on Day 4 as well as all brooch info at the Vault.)

Best Comeback
Zara Phillips (Day 4)
Bouncing right back from a yellow number that made people ask all the wrong questions earlier in the week, this is simple but just the right silhouette for Zara. Lovely. Also, bonus grandmother/granddaughter hang out time:

Worst Step Back
Princess Beatrice (Day 4)
And she was doing so very well on Day 3. Alas, Beatrice - here with her mum and sister - stepped right back in that pile of tooooo muchhhhh that she got stuck in on Day 1, overdoing this skirt (which is already patterned and flared and wrinkled) with a fussy top and ankle straps and koosh ball flowers on her head. Princess Eugenie did it better on Day 3, and is doing it better retro-style here too.

Best Ascot Spirit
Lady Helen Taylor
Let it be known that I do not like bugs on my hats anymore than I like them on my jewelry. But it's Ascot! Someone has to have a little millinery fun. We've seen some big royal hats this year, but I think this is the only one that's really brought the whimsy that one can pull off at the biggest hat parade of the year.

Now that we've reached the end of the Ascot fun, it's time for the final question:

What was your favorite Ascot outfit for 2015?
(Voting for the Yorks on Day 3, myself.)

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated

Royal Fashion Awards: Royal Ascot 2015, Days 2 & 3

Comment   
We took a day off from our Ascot coverage, so let's play catch up with a big roundup of royal racegoers:

Best in Gents
The Duke of Edinburgh (Days 2 and 3)
Ascot is my annual time to give the dapper Duke his due. His top hats are "antique", as the Royal Hats Blog explains, which in this case means they're his from fifty years ago. (Princess Anne: "SEE?") For her part, the Queen delighted me with another amazing brooch from Queen Victoria, Prince Albert's Sapphire, and then did an abrupt 180 the next day in a probably modern and hardly as lavish piece, the Shamrock Brooch. I like to think she just wanted us to save up our jumpy claps, knowing that the Duchess of Cornwall was about to pile on pounds of diamonds that evening. Her Maj is gracious like that. (Oh yes, Camilla had a BIG tiara appearance and it is covered at the Vault!)

Best in Comebacks
Princess Beatrice (Day 3) and the Princess Royal (Day 2)
We might as well call this the Triumph of the White Dresses category, because both of these ladies used that simplicity for accessory success after accessory semi-disasters on Day 1. Beatrice continued to play with color - and with handbags - and I adore it. I also adore Anne with a scarf draped gracefully over her shoulders.
Beatrice's dress from Beulah London, hat from Laura Apsit Livens

Biggest Statements in Patterns
Princess Alexandra (Day 2) and The Princess Royal (Day 3)
Alexandra will win you over to her festival of paisley with her cheery smile and her festive hat trim; Anne will simply dare you compare her to a luxury carpet with her steely gaze. But they both come out pretty well in the end.

Biggest Statement in Feathers
Princess Michael (Day 2) and The Countess of Wessex (Day 3)
Positively swashbuckling, these two - in other words, perfect for Ascot. Well done. (The Countess of Wessex Blog explains that Sophie's Jane Taylor hat looks like a slight remix from a previous Ascot appearance, with some extra stuff added. Can't ever get enough extra stuff to stick on your Ascot hat.)

Best in Couture
Princess Haya (Day 2) and Princess Marie-Chantal (Day 3)
Princess Haya continued her couture Ascot run in Chanel Couture with a Philip Treacy hat, and on Ladies' Day, Princess Marie-Chantal of Greece joined in the fun also in Chanel Couture and Philip Treacy. I have to say, it's a good combo.
Haya's suit modified from Spring 2015; Marie-Chantal's jacket from Spring 2011

Best in Forehead-Bolters
The Countess of Wessex (Day 2), Autumn Phillips (Day 2), and Princess Eugenie (Day 3)
I was expecting to like this latest batch of Ascot fashions so much. (It is Friday, perhaps I'm feeling generous.) I don't even mind a round of my least favorite sort of hat, the one that doesn't cover much of your head except for maybe parts of your vision because hey who needs that. I like all these three! Sophie's all stripey, Autumn's all springy, and Eugenie's all swingy.
Emilia Wickstead for Sophie; Hobbs for Autumn (h/t Countess of Wessex Blog); Peter Pilotto dress and Helmut Lang blazer for Eugenie
Bonus points to Eugenie for picking just the right shape of blazer to add to that dress. I think this is my favorite Eugenie outfit in a long time, which makes the York sisters my day 2 and 3 faves, which is also something that hasn't happened in a long time. Stranger things have happened at sea...

Who's your Ascot Best Dressed for Days 2 & 3?

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated / Beulah London / Laura Apsit Livens / Style.com / Instagram / ModaOperandi / Hobbs / Saks

Royal Fashion Awards: Royal Ascot 2015, Day 1

Comment   
Ascot's first day was a day of statement pieces - the occasional successful one, and then some other statement items which...were also present. Let's discuss:

Best in Surprises
The Queen
I was going to tell you all about how much I love Lilibet in this vibrant cerise from Peter Enrione with an Angela Kelly hat, but every time I look at her I get lost in that brooch and can't find my way out again. This is a VERY EXCITING brooch selection, and you can obvs read all about it at the Vault (Ascot post here, full brooch post here).

Worst in FrankenHats
The Duchess of Cornwall and The Princess Royal
I'm pretty sure Camilla's hat is a perfectly plain brimmed number that just sat right down on top of another, more interesting hat, which is now trying desperately to free itself from below. (Maybe this is why the Duchess of Gloucester's hats always grow those weird stems: safety precaution! No hat's gonna risk sitting on that.) Its saving grace - on top of a busy top half to the outfit underneath - is the single color, but I still can't condone this type of hat-on-hat violence. Which is precisely why Princess Anne's hat gets the real worst in show here.
How many hats had to die in a millinery cage match to make this single mishmash of a chapeau? Somebody needs to put down the glue gun and walk away. Kudos to Anne for still fitting into an outfit from 1980 and all, but please try again in the headgear department.

Most Adequate in Black and White
Lady Sarah Chatto, Autumn Phillips, Princess Michael of Kent
Okay, Sarah Chatto's is brown too, but whatever. It matters not. These are all okay. Mostly, I'd just like to know why Princess Michael didn't go all in with a half black/half white eyepatch.

Most in Need of De-Fussing
Princess Beatrice
This is a bold skirt for her, and I love it! I just wish she'd cut back some of the extra fuss on the shoes and the hat so the skirt could shine, instead of being the third piece in the outfit fighting for your attention.
Roksanda Ilincic skirt

Best Runway Omission
Princess Haya
I wouldn't have thought to turn a couture gown into an outfit for the races, but at least she left off the boots, which were thigh high and vinyl and all over the latest Dior couture runway. Princess Haya (daughter of the late King Hussein of Jordan, and wife of Sheikh Mohammed, ruler of Dubai) usually stops my heart at least once with her Ascot couture parade each year, but we're not quite there yet on Day 1.
Christian Dior Spring 2015 Couture

Best in Statement Pieces
The Countess of Wessex
Yessssss. This is how you do it! Sophie's white Emilia Wickstead dress is simple enough to let the hat take center stage, but isn't boring on its own. Second place to only Her Maj in my eyes.

Best in Gents
Prince Harry and Mike Tindall
On the one hand, the long reign of terror of Prince Harry's infamous yellow waistcoat, worn to all things for all time, is over - or, at least, temporarily interrupted by a dashing new blue number. (It won Zara Phillips' approval, saying hello in cheery yellow from Paul Castelloe.)
On the other hand, Mike Tindall's curtsey game is strong. So I'll call it a tie.

Who takes home your Ascot Best Dressed Crown for Day 1?

Photos: Via Getty Images as indicated, Moda Operandi, Style.com

wedding

[australian native wedding][recentbylabel2]

Featured

[Featured][recentbylabel2]
Notification
Wondering what style of flower bouquets you'll choose for your big day?
Done