Ottoman Dress and Design in the West

  Those of you who have known me for a long, long time might remember that I once wrote a proposal for a book on how Islam influenced Western culture in fundamental ways.(1) Those of you who’ve known me even longer know that my dissertation was titled Building the Orient of the Imagination: Excess, Confusion…

Read More

History on Display: Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity

Last week, my writing pal Amy Sue Nathan and I headed off to the Art Institute of Chicago to see the hot new exhibit, Impressionism, Fashion and Modernity. * It wasn’t quite what I expected. I was looking for what the museum describes as “a la mode as the harbinger of la modernité“. I wanted…

Read More