While her husband may be leader of the free world, all eyes were on Michelle Obama during the President’s inauguration. While the President’s speech discussed controversial and topical subjects (like climate change and gay marriage), the press was a twitter (literally) with the First Lady’s fashion choices.
Michelle is not the first Presidential Wife to be viewed as a fashion icon. From as early as Dolley Madison, the public looked to the First Lady as a force majeure in ladies fashion. In honor of the trend of fashionable first ladies, the Library of Congress has published its: “First Ladies of Fashion.”
Apropos of the subject, Goodwin’s book “Team of Rivals” imprinted the character of Lincoln’s wife, Mary Todd, indelibly in my mind. She was intelligent, well-educated, eccentric, self-absorbed, prideful, a spendthrift, and in the end, quite nutty. At one point during her husband’s presidency, Goodwin reports that she bought 300 pairs of suede gloves for herself. Eat your heart out, Imelda Marcos!