fluvia 85: Fluvia and Casual Clothes

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Chapter 85: Fluvia and Casual Clothes

“Why are we wearing such shabby clothes when we’re going to the Palace?”

Brother looks down at his clothes as we’re in the carriage, tagging along to the Royal Palace with Father and Sir Edgar.

Oh dear, this Brother of mine…

Certainly, these clothes aren’t the normally extravagant outfits we wear to the Royal Palace, but to call them shabby is a little…

Besides, what Brother and I are wearing are still considered plenty luxurious compared to the average citizen of Valed.

Further besides, even though they’re ready-made clothes that came from a branch ateliette, our Rosetta Atelier is still the one that designed these clothes.

Tailor-made clothes was the only type of ready-made clothing that existed before Rosetta Atelier extended it’s Signature Ateliette and Polyantha Ateliette.

If you didn’t want to buy tailor-made, the only other option was buying second-hand clothing.

As someone who came from modern-day Japan, I found it quite a pity that clothing boutiques and shopping streets were few and far between, even in the Capital.

The convenience of being able to run out and purchase something in an emergency was also nonexistent.

And so, I proposed the Signature Ateliette, a line of clothing featuring more office-type formal wear, and the Polyantha Ateliette, a line of clothing featuring simpler clothing for everyday wear.

It was difficult to get the designers to accept the idea of ready-made clothing, since people in Valed had never thought of designing clothing so that more than one person could wear the same style.

The idea of multiple people wearing the exact same style of outfit was somehow … demeaning? to the designer.

I’m not sure I understood their feelings on it, since people often requests to Atelier’s to have a dress designed like Lady So-and-so’s at the latest garden party or whatever anyway, so it’s not like the designs for dresses were complete one-offs.

They were somehow convinced when I pointed out that there were many types of clothing that didn’t matter if they were unique or not.

Formal wear, like for officials’ everyday use or important business negotiations, would actually detract from their effectiveness if they were too unique and flamboyant, and is there really any need for everyday clothing to be one-of-a-kind and luxurious?

Although the Polyantha Ateliette’s clothing were still plenty luxurious enough.

At any rate, the Signature and Polyantha Ateliettes were made, and they’re getting a lot more business than the designers thought they would.

It just goes to show that there was a difference in how the designers thought and how the general public thought, I guess.

I’m sure the fact that I had a hand in some of the designs that looked a bit more like Japan’s high-end office wear and more modern clothing had nothing to do with it whatsoever…

Of course I wasn’t foolish enough to jump straight into modern-day styles that would clash with the customs and ideals of Valed.

Instead, my designs were sometimes Victorian, sometimes Edwardian, but with a tinge of modernity in them.

With the lace-and-jewels glamour of Valed, modern-day Japan’s simple can be a little too simple, after all.

Furthermore, modern-day clothing … there isn’t a lot to hide behind, and without synthetic fibers, some things are just impossible to replicate.

That said, I’m amazed at what the textilers are able to come up with these days, blending the natural fibers for whatever they needed…

Anyway, there’s just no way to bring modern day fashion into Valed’s fashion circles, and honestly, I don’t know if I want to push Valed’s fashion in that direction.

No matter what time or location, women’s body shapes are under intense scrutiny, and so, of course, women in Valed tend to wear corsets, unless they’re performing physical labor.

Although I initially thought that all the corsetry and shapewear would be extremely uncomfortable, I found out that… well, they’re no more uncomfortable than modern-day spanx.

To get the hourglass shape, the corset doesn’t have to cinch in the midriff to uncomfortable degrees. It just smooths any bulges in the stomach and supports the breasts.

If you don’t, ahem, fill out the top of the corset, like Mother, you wear an overbust corset and stuff them.

Otherwise, the current trend is to wear an underbust to show off the full shape of the breasts.

As for that distinct thin-waist, apple-hips look, that’s almost always an optical illusion where the hips are ‘widened’ appropriately with petticoats.

It really makes me feel like… modern-day corset wearers in Japan are to concerned with how thin the waist is, or perhaps it’s because we had so many other alternatives to corsets that corsets were just synonymous with ‘uncomfortable’.

That said, there ARE women who displace bits of their midriff to make their waists thinner than they actually are with corsets.

No matter what day or age, there are always people who dislike their natural bodies to the extent where they endure discomfort and take drastic measures, and there are always people like Mother, who was far too conscious of her body shape despite being able to hide it.

If you think about it, the modern-day clothing in Japan, besides being far too full of plastic fibers, tended to put the body’s natural form on blatant display.

Instead of using the structures of a corset and petticoat to form the hourglass, it seems like we relied on dieting and exercise a lot more.

Although there were also waist trainers and spanx.

Not that an eternally 20-year-old woman would EVER have to rely on those…

A-anyway, I’m reluctant to bring Valed’s fashion into the ‘modern era’ of thigh gaps, harsh dieting, and ‘toning’, even if the corsets can be uncomfortable.

Instead I’m aiming at Edwardian fashion, or late-Victorian with some modern twists.

After all, Valed’s fashion is similar to Victorian period fashion; even if Valed’s public are looking for something different, there’s a limit to how far one should make the leap.

Edwardian era style dresses will help a lot in bridging Valed’s old trends into a new era more reminiscent of my own preferences.

Besides, I quite liked the look of Edwardian-styled lace blouses paired with more modern skirts or pants before my reincarnation.

Now, as for the corsetry, I’m not saying it’s perfect or anything; it’s just less awful than I initially thought.

If you’re doing anything that requires a lot of movement it’s unbearable to wear, so many working women with physical demands either won’t bother, or they just have to endure it.

Simply turning the corset into a bra won’t address the body-smoothing effect that corsets give, either.

It would be nice to be able to have less stiff bits in corsets, but performing all that structuring with just fabric without elastics or synthetic fibers would make it far too warm… we’ll have to think about the direction we want to take this.

A-anyway, although I’m ‘modernizing’ the fashion a bit, it’s probably not even a century’s leap ahead in Earth’s fashion timeline.

My main outlets for these ‘new’ fashions are the Signature Ateliette and the Polyantha Ateliette.

The motto for Rosetta’s Signature Ateliette is “Simple, Elegant, and Timeless,” featuring blouses of all sorts, including lace, neckties and ribbons, and suit-style separates with vests, jackets, pants, and skirts of varying styles, as well as more somber, less flashy but still formal-looking dresses and outfits.

In modern times, it would be considered business-formal fashion.

As for Rosetta’s Polyantha Ateliette, the motto is “Glamour on the Go.”

Personally, I wanted “Affordable Luxury,” but there was no way I’d be able to convince the designers to go with that.

I’m not even sure the customers would be attracted to that motto; extravagant expenses are the name of the game in Valed, after all.

Anyway, the whole idea behind Polyantha is ease of movement, ease when putting it on, and convenience.

A lot of it is separates, where you can mix and match tops, bottoms, and jackets to suit your style, which wasn’t really a thing in Valed before, and the idea just … took off.

Like, it got really, really popular, especially among the wealthy-to-middling commoners who were enthusiastic about being able to pull off many different looks with the same item.

Accessories, like belts, scarves, and hats, are also becoming extremely popular, and the novelty of the entire mix-and-match idea completely overshadowed the less popular idea of buying premade clothing, and now, making ready-made isn’t so offputting to Rosetta designers in Polyantha Ateliette.

Well, buying ready-made in Valed still comes with tailoring if necessary, anyway…

That said, Polyantha is still rather expensive for the average civilian, about a month or two’s pay for a cheaper outfit,since the clothes are basically lower-end noble clothing.

So really, Brother, calling what we’re wearing ‘shabby’ would be extremely offensive to some people.

Even though I know what he meant by that, I think it wouldn’t go over well if others were to hear him.

Not to mention that he’s kiiiind of insulting to our very own Atelier… hah…

Well, he’s kind of the airheaded athletic type, so maybe it’s okay?

I don’t want to be a naggy sister, and as an eternally 20-year-old inside, I lose track of how much I should nitpick him over his various shortcomings.

I mean, it’s not like he should be a perfect little Lord or anything… I think it’s important for him to be himself … but when I think about how much trouble his mouth is going to get him in in the future, I can’t help but feel a little anxious.

… I suppose he has his good looks for the future, if nothing else.

As I’m wondering whether or not to say something, Father, sitting in between us, laughs and pats Brother on the head.

“Now now, if you’re dressed shabbily, what will other people be able to say? Besides, don’t the clothes suit you two? My children are very good-looking, after all.”

Father puffs his chest out a little.

“Uh… well, it’s not like I think it’s completely shabby, but compared to what we usually wear to the Palace…”

“Since you don’t think it’s completely shabby, something like ‘simple’ or ‘unsuitable would be better. Although Father and I understand you fine, other people wouldn’t get it.”

“Okaaay~.”

Brother impishly responds to my chiding.

I’m not his mother, so I swallow the lecture I wanted to give and just wrinkle my nose out at Brother as he mischievously sticks his tongue out a little at me.

I’m his twin sister, so I can make faces at my brother, right?

Well, even if it’s not okay, I’m going to~.

I feel like my emotional age has regressed a little, but it’s inevitable, right?

I ignore Edgar, who’s sitting opposite us in the same carriage, trying to hide his chuckling.

“We’ve only come to the Palace before for the Festivals before, so it’s inevitable that we had to dress up much more glamorously before, but today we’re only here to return the visit to our friends. There’s no need to dress up for the public, so it’s only obvious to dress more appropriately. They didn’t dress up extravagantly when they came to visit us either, right?”

The Princes and Queen Ria were actually also wearing clothing from Polyantha when they visited us last night.

There’s currently no competing Ateliers with that kind of style, after all, even though those types of clothes are so popular for everyday wear right now.

Polyantha Ateliette only debuted half a year ago, after all, and many of the styles are still a bit too new for other Ateliers to wrap their heads around, but it’s only a matter of time before copycat, and original versions of these styles, start coming out.

“Hm… … hm…. I don’t really get it.”

Brother furrows his brows together, as if he’s fully trying to comprehend what I’m saying, but I’m definite he’s not really interested.

And his bad habit is not bothering to spend effort on anything he’s not interested in.

Haa….

Well, I dragged Brother along unwittingly to visit the Princes today anyway, so it’s not like I don’t understand his current confusion to the change in today’s schedule, but it’s not like he had anything else to do.

What, training all day in the training yard?

You do that all the time at home!

Let’s do something else, geez.

Also, please come with me to make it obvious that the Dellarose House is 100% not making a move on Prince Anthony for the Debut Season, please.

It’s not like I’m making him come unwillingly, though.

Brother is also very interested in the situation with Prince Anthony and all the girls, although I think he wants to point in laugh.

Um… not that I have any of that same sort of feeling myself… of course not… ahem.

Either way, now that I’ve convince Brother to come along, I’m not feeling any stress about ulterior motives from going to the see the Princes.

We’re not dressed fancily, we’re coming as a pair, and it’s already a known fact that the Dellarose twins are close to the two young Princes.

By nullifying a lot of the suspicious factors, this has really become just a fun visit to a friend’s house.

Although the house is the Royal Castle within the Palace, and Father wants to parade us around a little first.

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<a/n:

An ateliette is not a real thing – I thought, and then I remembered ‘atelier’ is French, so there very well could be an ateliette. Ooooh weeell.
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