Talk:Michelle Smith (fashion designer)

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 21:26, 10 November 2020 (UTC)

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• ... that American fashion designer Michelle Smith created the dress for First Lady Michelle Obama's official portrait? Source: “The dress was a bespoke creation from American designer Michelle Smith of the label Milly” Vogue, “Michelle Obama Wears Milly in Her Official Portrait—Here’s the Story Behind the Dress”
  • ALT0A:... that at the unveiling of First Lady Michelle Obama's official portrait, designer Michelle Smith learned Obama had chosen one of Smith's dresses for the sitting? Source: “her publicist called to tell her that Michelle Obama’s official portrait had been unveiled at the National Portrait Gallery and the former first lady was wearing Smith’s dress in the painting.” WashPost
  • ALT0B:... that First Lady Michelle Obama chose a dress from American fashion designer Michelle Smith to wear in Obama's official portrait? Source: “The dress was a bespoke creation from American designer Michelle Smith of the label Milly” Vogue, “Michelle Obama Wears Milly in Her Official Portrait—Here’s the Story Behind the Dress”
  • ALT0C:... that Michelle Obama chose designer Michelle Smith to dress her for her official portrait? Source: “The dress was a bespoke creation from American designer Michelle Smith of the label Milly” Vogue, “Michelle Obama Wears Milly in Her Official Portrait—Here’s the Story Behind the Dress”
  • ALT1:... that fashion designer Michelle Smith was the first American employee at the Hermès atelier in Paris? Source: "Around the time of graduation, she wrote the president of Hermès a letter asking for an internship. She became the first American employee at the fashion house in Paris." Houston Chronicle
  • ALT2:... that a dress by American fashion designer Michelle Smith is featured in the National Portrait Gallery as it was Michelle Obama’s selection to wear in her official portrait? Source: “her publicist called to tell her that Michelle Obama’s official portrait had been unveiled at the National Portrait Gallery and the former first lady was wearing Smith’s dress in the painting.” WashPost
  • ALT3: ... that the Michelle Smith dress Michelle Obama wore in her official portrait inspired painter Amy Sherald with echoes of the Gee’s Bend quilts? Source: “a halter gown printed with geometric shapes. The dress was a bespoke creation from American designer Michelle Smith ... Sherald spoke about how the dress reminded her of a quilt from Gee’s Bend.” Vogue
  • ALT3A: ... that the geometric print dress Michelle Smith designed for Michelle Obama’s official portrait inspired painter Amy Sherald with echoes of the Gee’s Bend quilts? Source: “a halter gown printed with geometric shapes. The dress was a bespoke creation from American designer Michelle Smith ... Sherald spoke about how the dress reminded her of a quilt from Gee’s Bend.” Vogue

• Reviewed: Journey of the Sorcerer
• Comment: This entry is ripe for illustration but unfortunately the portait is a non-free image and I haven’t been able to find a different image of one of Smith’s other design to pair with an alternative hook.

Created by Innisfree987 (talk). Self-nominated at 22:36, 31 October 2020 (UTC).

Interesting life and work, on fine sources, no copyvio obvious. I think the original hook is more unique than the other. How about adding to the nice fact that Obama chose her if I understand the dress article right. ... or the meaning of the quilt tradition? ... or the woman artist? - some spice ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:23, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for this review Gerda Arendt! I agree. I’ll continue to punch up the hook options as well as complete the QPQ and then ping with the update! Innisfree987 (talk) 01:30, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Ok, new options but I struggled to be pithy! If you have suggestions for trimming the wording, Gerda Arendt, by all means, I’d welcome it! Innisfree987 (talk) 03:53, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for struggling, and I can see better why, and almost feel sorry for having asked. However, this is such a good topic that - if you like - you might be willing to struggle further? Or go for featured article, and then you can say a bit more ;) - I could approve ALT0A once a qpq is provided. My take on that one is

ALT0D: ... that Michelle Smith learned only when Michelle Obama's official portrait was unveiled that a dress from her collection had been chosen for the sitting?

Please put further suggestions below (if any), - easier for the prep builder. I see that to speak of Mondrian and quilts - to say something about the actual design which we can unfortunately not show - is too hard for a short sentence, because another person is involved who needs to be mentioned. Striking those unless you can condense them in ALTs. I also don't read that the artist was "inspired", only "reminded". Striking the National Gallery because I understand that all these gowns (nice word in the article!) go there - too little about Smith. The article doesn't say that Obama (in person) made the selection. Change that, or change ALT0C if you want to go that way. - DYK that your name reminds me of this wonderful place, with a poor article in English? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:56, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

I do think it’s a good topic (I started out just wanting to give a little write-up and now think it could satisfy GA at least!) but I’m still struggling to make it snappy. Best I could do is:

ALT0E: ... that the unveiling of Michelle Obama’s official portrait surprised Michelle Smith with the news that a gown from her collection had been chosen for the sitting?

But either of the other two remaining options work for me too—at this point I don’t think I’m likely to come up with something shorter. QPQ is set, I had just misformatted-sorry about that! And thank you for the pointer to that lovely garden. Over the years I have learned several different meanings of my name! A pleasure of the project. Innisfree987 (talk) 22:21, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. I left D and E for the prep builder, thinking that E flows better. - Yes, a pleasure! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:38, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

“Official portrait”

Hi Ravenpuff, thank you for your work brushing up this and related entries. I wanted to touch base about the term “official portrait”. To me it’s important to include because that’s how it’s recurrently characterized in secondary sources and I think without it, an important aspect of the significance may be lost to the general audience (which is, I would guess, also why so many sources use it. Even as someone interested in the topic, a portrait for a portrait gallery doesn’t sound to me like it’s nearly as important as this commission was.) Could we say “official portrait for the National Portrait Gallery” to keep the specificity that you are pointing out while retaining fidelity to the sources and conveying the significance to the reader? Innisfree987 (talk) 20:00, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

@Innisfree987: Sure, that seems fine to me; I've re-added the word "official" at least into the lead. As long as we don't use just "official portrait" without qualification (for reasons of specificity etc.), I don't think that should be controversial. FYI, I've also placed a report at WP:ERRORS about this same technicality in the article's DYK hook. — RAVENPVFF · talk · 21:58, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Ravenpuff, appreciate your flagging, I’ve replied there. Thank you for your collaboration on this! Innisfree987 (talk) 22:12, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Obama portrait unveiling

• ... though Smith only learned of the final selection when the painting was unveiled at the National Portrait Gallery.: From WP:ERRORS for the article's DYK, I'm removing this as it's unclear from the source whether she was only learned about the use of her dress at the unveiling or she was just suprised that it was finally unvelied. The Washington Post just says "I didn’t know it was going to be unveiled today. Did everyone else know? Was I the last to know?”[1] The source later says "The dress was chosen months ago, Smith says, ..." In an interwiew with Smith (not cited in the article), she seems to say she more overcome that the unveiling finally happened. "I worked with Mrs. Obama’s stylist, Meredith Koop, about a year and a half ago to custom design the dress, and I later received confirmation that she would likely be wearing it in the portraits. I was told to keep this news quiet, and as time passed and I became immersed in designing and running my business, the portrait slipped my mind! I was in Paris just after New York Fashion Week for Premiere Vision when the portrait was unveiled and I received the news. Although I knew this moment was coming, it was hard to believe until I saw it with my own eyes."[2]—Bagumba (talk) 09:50, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

  Bagumba, this relied on the way that Post story begins: “Designer Michelle Smith was standing in the middle of a jean shop in the Marais neighborhood of Paris when her publicist called to tell her that Michelle Obama’s official portrait had been unveiled at the National Portrait Gallery and the former first lady was wearing Smith’s dress in the painting.“ Seems straightforward to me. “Likely” in your source also in my mind confirms she wasn’t informed of the final selection, as the entry previously said. Innisfree987 (talk) 14:23, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

  Innisfree987: I was originally reading it from the DYK hoook's perspective that she was surprised to learn that day that her dress was chosen." Looking over your explanation of the article (and not the hook), I can also see now your perspective of the "final selection" wording. I think for the article, it can be added that she was told beforehand that it was likely her dress would be chosen, but she received final confirmation the day of the unveiling. That would be in line with her saying "I knew this moment was coming".—Bagumba (talk) 15:34, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

  Bagumba, thanks for taking the time to look over this. I’ll see if I can find a succinct way to add it all in—just don’t want this section to overwhelm the rest of the biography, especially since there’s a main entry about the painting. But I’ll tinker with it keeping these points in mind. Innisfree987 (talk) 20:46, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

  Just for completeness, at this point—in case this ever needs revisiting—here’s one of the other refs that informed that line and the hook. From this NYT piece cited in the entry: “Ms. Smith worked on sketches, adjustments and pulled the dress from her collection to keep it special, but still wasn’t sure it would be selected. ‘I had made coats for the second inauguration that weren’t chosen, so I didn’t think it was a slam dunk,’ she said.” Innisfree987 (talk) 00:49, 19 November 2020 (UTC)