Lady In Waiting

Lettice Knollys 1540- 1634.

After researching a lot into the elizabethan culture and historical fashion and makeup i wanted to research more into Elizabeth's private life and try and find some inspiration for my character for my final piece.

Lettice Knollys, countess of Leicester 1585.

Lettice Knollys was a noblewoman and Lady in Waiting to Queen Elizabeth the first. She had quite a scandalous life which led to much bitterness and angst between Queen Elizabeth and herself.

Facts:

• Cousin to Queen Elizabeth and resembled the Queen a lot.
• Married Walter Devereux, the Earl of Essex in 1561
• She had five children with Walter.
• Lettice was often at court because of her job and a relationship between herself and Robert Dudley, The Earl of Leicester.
• Her husband was away in Ireland for four years and Lettice lived near the Earl of Leicester, she began seeing him in private.
• An anonymous pamphlet spread a rumour about Lettice being pregnant with Dudley's child and  had an abortion. 
• The Earl of Essex dies  of dysentery, people gossiped that the Earl of Leicester had poisoned him.
• Lettice and Robert married soon after in a secret ceremony and was witnessed by few people.
• When her marriage to Robert Dudley became common knowledge, the Queen was said to have banished her from court.
• died in 1634 at the age of 94.

Source: http://www.tudorplace.com.ar/Bios/LetticeKnollys.htm

Personality Traits:

• Promiscuous 
• secretive
• devious/sly  
• dramatic life full of gossip
• lived a life of wealth and luxury
• Dressed similarly to Elizabeth - could say she copied her 

Portrayal of Lettice Knollys from the BBC television drama 'The Virgin Queen' 

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/virginqueen/sienna_guillory.shtml  - Interview with Sienna Guillory, the actress who plays Lettice in the TV drama.

This television series shows a very realistic interpretation of what a lady in waiting would look like. the hair style is very traditional with the volume at the top of the head, the strawberry blonde hair and the hat demurely placed on top of her head and to the side. Then her makeup, the pale face, but not white, with red lips and very thin eyebrows. I actually prefer this natural looking makeup to that of what Queen Elizabeth was meant to have worn on her face.  

I have a few ideas for the style of my final piece based on the facts i found out about lettice. Because i am greek and my skin is slightly darker than that of an English Queen or lady in waiting i think i would like to make my lady in waiting have an ethnic background from a country in or around the mediteranian. Maybe taking the idea of  Elizabeth's connections to the Spanish court to create a character gifted to her by the King of Spain. However i want to use the contemporary interpretation of the Elizabethan look to create a high fashion, urban looking makeup and hair design that could be seen being worn on the streets of a busy city in modern day society.

My Character:

• dark hair 
• dark eyes 
• middle eastern looking 
• promiscuous 
• bold eyebrows to modernise look?
• seductive/ flirtatious  
• ruthless, cut throat attitude to men and love.
• confident

I think this small list of ideas for my character can help me to produce an interesting character background. 

Makeup looks for inspiration:

I wanted to look at a blog that would inspire me with very professional and high quality makeup pictures. i went onto the illamasqua website to look at some makeup ideas on their inspire section of the website.

Illamasqua Earth collection has the distinct luminous messy hair and no eyebrows that are featured in the Elizabethan era.

Illamasqua Once collection has the perfect set of colours that could be used for my makeup look even though the look is a mixture between 15th and 18th century makeup and clothing. i will think about investing in some of these products.