Before Kate Middleton’s impossibly bouncy blowout was being splashed across the landing page of every style website, there came Michelle Obama. Her refreshingly colorful style was tempered with ladylike elegance necessary for a First Lady and a certain all-American warmth and accessibility – and combined with the rise of golden-age fashion in pop culture (shows like Mad Men, collections like Marc Jacobs’s Fall 2010 effort at Louis Vuitton) seemed to signal the resurgence of the lost art of the well-dressed lady. Enter Kate – embodying British elegance with a solid dose of down-to-earth good fashion sense. It’s fascinating to see cultures reflected through their well-dressed women, and these ladies both hit the mark with their style.
