{"id":27458,"date":"2014-10-01T23:53:03","date_gmt":"2014-10-01T15:53:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=27458"},"modified":"2014-10-01T23:53:28","modified_gmt":"2014-10-01T15:53:28","slug":"tim-gunn-sizes-up-first-lady-fasion-dos-and-donts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/10\/01\/tim-gunn-sizes-up-first-lady-fasion-dos-and-donts\/","title":{"rendered":"Tim Gunn sizes up First Lady fashion do’s and don’ts"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tim<\/a>
Tim Gunn “makes it work” at the 13th annual spring picnic in New York (lev radin \/ Shutterstock)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WASHINGTON — Michelle Obama went under Tim Gunn’s fashion microscope and got an approving nod, but not all first ladies fared as well – Hillary Rodham Clinton among them.<\/p>\n

Gunn and a panel of fashion experts reviewed the fashion sense of the nation’s first ladies at a National Archives forum Tuesday, and found plenty of do’s and don’ts.<\/p>\n

Gunn rated Mrs. Obama’s style sense as “divine.” Jacqueline Kennedy he deemed a “style-setter.” But he wondered why Edith Wilson, wife of Woodrow Wilson, felt compelled to play amateur seamstress and remake her dresses over and over.<\/p>\n

As a designer, Wilson “would have been the first one out on `Project Runway,'” the fashion consultant and TV personality joked.<\/p>\n

“She was having difficulty making it work,” Gunn said, in a play on his trademark admonition to “make it work.”<\/p>\n

As for possible future administrations, Gunn said Clinton has been looking “very presidential lately. There’s definitely an evolution that’s been taking place. The bar has been raised.”<\/p>\n

Other panelists said it had taken Clinton some time to warm up to the idea that a first lady’s style reflects on her husband’s administration.<\/p>\n

“I just feel like it’s not important to her,” designer Tracy Reese said. “Public service is very important, but her appearance is down on the list.”<\/p>\n

Valerie Steele, director of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, said Clinton’s signature style from her days as first lady was “the famous pantsuit and the hair problems.”<\/p>\n

Looking further back in history to the 1800s, Steele noted that in the days of Sarah Polk, wife to James Polk, women wanted to show off a tiny waist, hands and feet, but have “plump, voluptuous shoulders and a big, big butt.”<\/p>\n

“That sounds like Nicki Minaj, JLo and Kim K.,” Reese declared. She eyed a picture of an ivory brocade dress of Polk’s with a flouncy bottom and wondered aloud, “Can you imagine Kim Kardashian in that?”<\/p>\n

Gunn sniffed, “I’d prefer not to.”<\/p>\n

The forum was held at the National Archives, which has “signature” items worn by Mrs. Kennedy and Mrs. Obama on display as part of its exhibit, “Making Their Mark: Stories Through Signatures.”<\/p>\n

Among the items on display: the black and red Narciso Rodriguez dress worn by Mrs. Obama on the night of the 2008 election in Chicago and a pillbox hat worn by Mrs. Kennedy.<\/p>\n

The forum was presented in partnership with the White House Historical Association.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON — Michelle Obama went under Tim Gunn’s fashion microscope and got an approving nod, but not all first ladies …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":27551,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1482,36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-fashion-and-beauty","mauthors-nancy-benac","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27458\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}