'like a bottle of champagne on an empty stomach'

In 1953, the fashionable streets of New York bloomed with Belle Epoque nostalgia. Cristobal Balenciaga was enjoying the pinnacle of his career. Bustles, hoops, corsets, and crispy crinolines flared under his confections. Like the dressmakers of the nineteenth century, Balenciaga could actually cut and sew, and his refined technique reflected the era's desire for elegance. Christian Dior had ushered in this stylized, hyperfeminine silhouette in 1947 with his New Look. His boned bodices, nipped waists, and bouffant skirts hit the postwar generation like a bottle of champagne on an empty stomach. A New Look dress required dozens of meters of extra fabric--thrilling after years of wartime austerity.

—Elizabeth Winder, Pain, Parties, Work: Sylvia Plath in New York, Summer 1953 (2013)