Midieval Luxury

A couple of days ago, I finished writing my first Wikipedia entry for a class on Medieval art and architecture. My teacher is amazing, she makes the content so enjoyable! Basically, it describes and analyses the book of Hours of Queen Jeanne d'Evreux. Back in the fourteenth century, when this particular illuminated manuscript was produced, books were really expensive. Basically the price of an illuminated manuscript such as the one above, is an equivalent to the price of a Rolex watch today, if not five. Jeanne received it as a gift from her husband Charles IV, sadly, he died only three years after the book was produced. I love the fact that back then, luxury was very much connected to education and devotion to God, the size or karat value of a diamond did not matter as much as it does today. I am actually quite proud of myself, which is a pretty unexpected ramification of the process. I spent a long time researching and reading journal articles, books, and so on so that the content was actually backed up by research. I would love it if you would take a look, and take the time to read it. Here is the link to the article, and you can look at images of the book here.

Hope you enjoy! :)
Image via metmuseum

Cool Mint

After four days of eager anticipation, my room is finally painted the colour I was dreaming of for the last six months. Let me say that the colour picking process was a complicated undertaking that I was not at all anticipating. I walked into Benjamin Moore thinking they were going to have the exact colour I was dreaming of, oh boy was I wrong. My only requirement was the "mint green" label if you will. I knew I wanted a light pastel green with a cool undertone and hints of grey but it was very difficult to: first of all explain this to the automated sales person who was running on auto-pilot and directly referred me to the very dark and grey-with-a-hint-of-dark-green colours ignoring  my mint-green condition I had with regards to my colour choice, and secondly, picking the right shade that had the best fusion of green,blue, and white in it (I dismissed the idea of grey undertones at this point). At last, I picked out my colour, Cool Mint. It goes amazingly well with my black and white furniture and the pink accents on my bedding. I find it to be elegant yet cool and hip.

Hope you enjoy.

Mitoufle

Oh, how much I love fashion history. Did you know that stockings were only invented in 1958? The stocking-panty in one combo, we know today was patented in France only in 1958! The most wonderful aspect about these first borns were their name, MITOUFLE! For some reason it makes me smile. It's such a cute name for something so essential and "boring" (in the we're-so-used-to-stockings-today-we-don't-think-about-them-anymore sense). When you think about it, what we consider as our winter essentials today, is quite a modern invention. The above ad for the invention says: "Every woman should have the real mitoufle. Exist in a soft, stretchy, (foam?=mousse), veil that does not slide off."