I might point out that wearing red and white on a visit to Canada has been done by other British royal women, including the Queen and the late Princess of Wales. This was Canada Day, a patriotic celebration. It wasn't out of line for the Duchess of Cambridge to acknowledge that celebration (as many Canadians themselves did) with a nod to patriotic symbolism. As I said earlier, the maple leaf hat was charming: whimsical but not weird. I saw far weirder hats among the Canadian crowd. Hers was small, elegant, chic - and flat-out fun.
Looking more closely at the Reiss cream dress, I did have some concerns about its length -- just a couple of inches too short -- and the zipper was showing. That's a design and quality problem.
As for her other choices: the Catherine Walker dress in a gray nail-head fabric didn't excite me. The back was elegantly cut, but otherwise it was boring. The sleeves were slightly puffy, as were the sleeves on the bird-print Issa dress, and my view has always been that no one over the age of 10 should wear any dress with even slightly puffed sleeves.
But I loved the purple Issa dress. I might mention to Americans who find it hard to purchase Issa (I've done it through Neiman Marcus, but it wasn't easy), that they should look at the designers Tadashi Shoji and David Meister. I own a blue Shoji dress that is identical in cut to the Duchess's purple dress, and a Meister dress very similar to Issa designs.
Just a quick question out of curiosity: the claim is that the Duchess is 5'10" tall. I don't think she can be, since even in 3" heels, she is several inches (4-5) shorter than the purportedly 6'3" Prince William. At 5'10", she shouldn't be more than 2 inches shorter than he is in her very high heels.
Of course, he may not be as tall as claimed, but I think she's no taller than 5'8" in her stocking feet.
What do other people think?
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