First lady Michelle Obama’s first ...

I think we can safely say that, at least from a sartorial standpoint, Michelle Obama’s first state dinner, for Prime Minister Singh and his wife, Gursharan Kaur, was a success.

Mrs. Obama looked fantastic. I’ve been critical of her choices over the past 15 months but there’s nothing to complain about here. The silvery color of this magnificent dress by Indian-American designer Naeem Kahn sets of her coloring, and the bare shoulders and slim silhouette highlight her extremely elegant shoulders — her best feature — and her height. (The Obamas towered over the evening’s special guests.) This is the dress I envisioned her wearing for the Inauguration (although I guess in retrospect the ivory was a better choice; this is just a more beautiful dress all the way around). You can get more details about the dress here. (Photo by Nicolas Kamm/Getty Images)

Official White House photo by Samantha Appleton

An even more stunning choice was the day outfit Mrs. Obama wore for greeting the Singhs earlier in the day. It’s a little hard to see the details on this dress in this photo but the dress is a lovely apricot brocade sheath (with matching coat) by Isaac Mizrahi.

Take a look at how carefully chosen the color is. Sure, it’s an homage to the warm colors of India, but it’s really chosen to set off Michelle Obama’s own warm coloring, and it does so absolutely perfectly. In this ensemble, both she and her outfit are all coppery — her skin, her lipstick, her shoes, and the dress. That dress is gorgeous, but the real star here is Michelle Obama herself. The chair upholstery provides a beautiful backdrop for the dress, and the flowers bring together the yellows in the room and the apricot color of the dress.

And look how Michelle Obama’s dress complement’s Gursharan Kaur’s sage-green sari — fabulous. As Mrs. O points out, these are two colors (along with white) in the Indian flag. Make no mistake, every detail is carefully planned and choreographed well in advance.

I’m an avid Michelle Obama-watcher but my purpose in doing so is to show other women how they can highlight their best assets (or detract from their own innate beauty with less flattering clothing choices). What’s your own coloring and how could you use your clothing choices to showcase them?

And, with the holidays (and lots of amateur photography) bearing down on us, how could you plan just a little bit so that those pictures come together pleasingly and flatteringly?

Perhaps you could ask your kids to wear clothes that kinda sorta go with each other’s (and your own) rather than setting out a mapcap floral frock for one and a plaid shirt in a completely unrelated colorway for the other child while wearing an outfit in yet a third color for yourself.

This doesn’t mean buying new clothes or making yourself crazy exerting tight control. (Just what those tension-filled family holidays don’t need!) Rather, find a single color that works well for one of you, a color that person owns some clothes in — say, blue — and work from there. Put the colors that flatter close to the face and call it a day.

It can help to remember that pictures of your dinner likely won’t be broadcast around the globe.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone — hope yours is peaceful, yummy, and stylish. (And please take a minute to subscribe to this blog before you head to the kitchen.)

Palin clothes update: It’s all for...

Now we learn from the McCain campaign, courtesy of Politico, that the clothes are headed for charity after the election. Of course! Why didn’t we think of that!?

Also, just stumbled across a great new (to me) blog, Pundit Mom, with a nice post about the Palin wardrobe dust-up.

Sarah Palin’s fabulous wardrobe: $...

Who’d a thunk it? $150K buys a lot of stuff, some good and some that definitely fall into the "What was she thinking?" category. This  picture (and the rest of the slideshow) are at Huffington Post, which as you might imagine has jumped on this story.

Not to pick on the family or anything, because I actually don’t really like to do that, but one of the daughters has an LV bag — a great pic I’d tried unsuccessfully to track down a while back. Of course, the family wasn’t exactly impoverished and may well have bought that bag on their own. Either scenario kind of puts a damper on their whole we’re-just-folks schtick, though, doesn’t it?

I saw the story first on Politico, which says this:

But hours after the story was posted on Politico’s website and legal issues were raised, the campaign issued a new statement.

"With all of the important issues facing the country right now, it’s
remarkable that we’re spending time talking about pantsuits and
blouses," said spokeswoman Tracey Schmitt. "It was always the intent
that the clothing go to a charitable purpose after the campaign."

Of course! What else were they going to say? But I suspect this story has legs (this morning it was the big story on Huff Post).

And this piece of it is so compelling that I find it tough to get worked up about the actual clothes involved. I will say this, though: The red suit with the (no doubt very expensive) boots? No, no, no. Not for the campaign trail and probably not ever. The suit looks dressy, as if it would be great for a businessy cocktails event. The boots are beautiful but just all wrong for the suit even if they’re brown but especially if they’re black. (What is it with her stylists and people in general thinking black and red are attractive together in any way?)

Politico‘s slide show of outfits is even better than Huff Post’s but I couldn’t capture the pictures. There’s one where she looks great in boots, and dark skirt, and an ivory jacket. But most of the outfits are, to me, misses.

Now, you can bet someone’s going to say: "But Michelle Obama’s clothes aren’t exactly cheap." (For more about Michelle’s clothes, I recommend Mrs. O.) But first, who is buying her clothes? I really, really hope the Obamas personally are paying her clothing bill. Second, I don’t see that she’s spent $150K on her and her family’s clothes (although I have no evidence for that, just my gut feeling). She by all accounts has a strong sense of her own style and let’s be fair: Chicago and Princeton (and the other places I may have left out) are probably more helpful to someone looking to hone her own style than, say, Wasilla, Alaska.

Need proof? Check out the pink bunny outfit Sarah’s wearing in her before picture.

Sarah Palin: In the White House...

Thanks to always-fabulous BagNewsNotes for twittering about this amusing image of Sarah Palin as president.

Sarah Palin on SNL this Saturday night...

The Boston Herald is reporting that Sarah Palin’s going to appear on SNL this Saturday night. Should be fun! Will she wear:
a) her old pageant dress
b) a black mini skirt and white button-down top (making fun of her too-short skirts and "serious" tops)
c) a flag bikini (accessorized with a shotgun)
d) a Sarah Palin Halloween costume, or
e) a snowsuit.

What do you think?