Episode 12: Balls & Baubles – Jewellery at the Beistegui, Capote and Rothschild Costume Balls

Dec 20, 2018

In this Season’s finale, Lucy and Ben talk with Levi Higgs about the jewellery worn at three of the twentieth-century’s most lavish and exclusive costume balls. Following Dress: Fancy’s patron saint, Cecil Beaton, who attended each of these events, this episode examines the significance of haute joaillerie and costume jewellery worn by the likes of Daisy Fellowes, Gloria Guiness and the inimitable Elizabeth Taylor.

 

Links

• Nick Foulkes, Bals: Legendary Balls of the Twentieth Century (2011)
• Nick Foulkes, ‘Don Carlos de Beistegui’, The Rake (March 2016): https://therake.com/stories/icons/don-carlos-de-beistegui/ 
• Deborah Davis, Party of the Century: The Fabulous Story of Truman Capote and His Black and White Ball (2006).
• Guy Trebay, ’50 Years Ago, Truman Capote Hosted the Best Party Ever’, The New York Times (21 November 2016): https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/21/fashion/black-and-white-ball-anniversary-truman-capote.html 
• Kenzie Bryant, ‘The Most Lavish High-Society Parties of the Last Half-Century’, Vanity Fair (24 November 2016): https://www.vanityfair.com/style/photos/2016/11/most-lavish-parties-black-and-white-surrealist-proust-ball 
• Patricia Corbett, Verdura: The life and work of a master jeweler (2002)
• Cecil Beaton: A Retrospective, ed. David Mellor (1986).
• Elizabeth Taylor, Elizabeth Taylor: My Love Affair with Jewellery (2002).
• Kenneth Jay Lane, Faking It (1996).