How to Style a Whimsical Menswear Look for SIA White Rabbit + A Special Guest
- sallyinstpaul
- Mar 26
- 8 min read
Shelbee at Shelbee on the Edge is the curator for this round of Style Imitating Art (SIA), and she absolutely outdid herself this time! She selected John Tenniel's illustration of the White Rabbit looking at his pocket watch, which sits on the first page of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. And to make it extra special, she chose it as a thank you to me because I am a regular participant in the SIA challenges! I don't think anyone could come up with a better artwork for me given how this combines rabbits and Alice. Shelbee provided us with a few different versions of the artwork to choose from. First is an uncolored black and white version (which is the one I am most familiar with from the original book).
The second one is a colored version with the Rabbit in a tan jacket, from the 1890 edition of The Nursery Alice, an abridged version of the story.
Third is a version with the Rabbit in a red jacket (which appears to be a common rendition for posters and wall art based on this illustration).
Let's start with our very special guest...my husband Robert posing as the White Rabbit! Robert created two versions of the outfit, one for each of the colorways of the artwork. Tan pants, green shirt, and brown shoes are the foundation of the look. For the tan version, he added a tan jacket with a dark collar that mimics the White Rabbit's cravat/ascot. For the red version, he added a maroon hoodie with dark grey fleece lining the hood, which harkens back to the Rabbit's soft fur.
He's inspecting a pocket watch pendant of mine that features the same White Rabbit drawing that is the inspiration artwork (red version) for the challenge. Little known "fact" about the Tenniel artwork: the pocket watch the White Rabbit is holding also features this drawing, so it creates an infinite regression of White Rabbits with pocket watches looking at White Rabbits with pocket watches. (I think Alice's author, mathematics professor Charles Dodgson - aka Lewis Carroll - would approve!)
Since I don't own any blazers or waistcoats for a more literal interpretation of the White Rabbit in his above-ground Victorian clothing, my version is a whimsical take on menswear. The first piece I selected was my red plaid pants (styled previously for SIA Cherokee Beadwork two years ago) to represent the Rabbit's plaid/check blazer. Although it's the "wrong" garment, the fabric looks just right. And if the White Rabbit were to be wearing trousers, it would be fun to imagine him in matching red plaid to make a little suit...perhaps for playing golf in?
I considered my jacket options, but none of them felt right, so I added a red wool cardigan instead. It has a bit of a Mr. Rogers vibe, but I'm OK with that; surely the White Rabbit also dresses down when he's at home in his little cottage. Fortunately we had a cool enough day that with the windows open and fans bringing in the outdoor air, it was around 59F in my apartment and I was comfortable wearing this warm layering piece. (Robert had wisely determined that he was late for an important date and skedaddled to his 72F office so I was able to take a very free hand with the apartment temperature.)
My shoes were the easiest part of this outfit. For the straight-up menswear feel, I have no better choice than my thrifted black Oxfords from Munro American, and they work nicely with the black in my plaid pants.
I could not easily imagine playing the Victorian gentleman without a white button up collared shirt, and luckily I do have one in my closet. I buttoned it all the way up and turned up the collar in the style of Lord Palmerston (actor Laurence Fox) from the Victoria TV show, who is my reference point for this. Then I wound my Alice in Wonderland scarf featuring the Tenniel artwork around the collar and fastened it with a magnet clasp to create a White Rabbit "cravat." (Like Humpty Dumpty's cravat, my scarf was an Unbirthday gift too...from me to me, I think.) I also layered a couple of necklaces underneath it: my DIY silver paperclip chain with the White Rabbit charm and the White Rabbit pocket watch pendant that Robert posed with above.
My all-DIY daily bracelet stack was a bit unusual because I used some seed bead bracelets and a small red bead bracelet with a sweet bunny charm, all of which I made in summer 2020, when I first experimented with this hobby; these easy seed bead bracelets on stretch cord were my first foray (gateway drug) into jewelry making. {stretch bracelet tutorial} On my other wrist, I wore the Jesse James Beads Alice charm bracelet that was a gift from my mom; note that it too features the White Rabbit in his court regalia as well as a pocket watch.
I had decided to make some White Rabbit earrings to wear with my outfit, but it turned out that I didn't need to! Summer 2021 I made a pair of the world's easiest hoop earrings using pre-made Amazon hoops, small red seed beads, and...you guessed it...White Rabbit in his court regalia charms. (Those charms are everywhere, it seems.) Putting beads and sometimes charms on pre-made earring hoops was my second foray into jewelry making. It was fun to wear these older seed bead pieces in my SIA outfit.
Actually, being inspired to pull older items out of my closet is definitely one of the satisfying aspects of participating in the SIA challenges! Let's see how old today's pieces are, organized newest to oldest:
-Red plaid pants (Kohls), 12/2022
-Silver paper clip chain/White Rabbit necklace (me), 8/2021
-Red seed bead/silver White Rabbit hoops (me), Summer 2021
-White button up tunic (CJ Banks), 7/2020
-Red seed bead & sweet bunny bracelets (me), Summer 2020
-Light red wool cardigan (thrifted, Lands End), 2/2018
-White Rabbit pocket watch pendant (Zad), 11/2015
-Black suede Oxfords (thrifted, Munro American), 12/2013
-White Alice scarf (NerdAlertCreations), 11/2013
Not only do I have a number of White Rabbit themed accessories in my wardrobe, I also have a couple of pieces of wall art with the White Rabbit in my apartment. A print of a postcard circa 1900-1910.
The White Rabbit as a cloud figure. (I shared a wide variety of my Alice-themed possessions in this post about my favorite movies, of which the 1951 Disney Alice in Wonderland animated film is right at the top of my list.)
But since it's (barely) still March, I believe I would be remiss not to pay tribute to the other rabbit that appears both in the Alice books and the 1951 Alice movie: the March Hare. This colored print of Tenniel's drawing of the Mad Hatter's Tea Party hangs above my bed.
Tenniel depicts the March Hare with straw on his head...which is something I never questioned as a child, assuming that he'd been mixing it up out in the fields as part of his March Madness, but that I now know was "a common way to depict madness in Victorian times" (Wikipedia). Apparently this started, as things so often do in the English language, with Shakespeare...or at least 19th century stage portrayals of Ophelia in Hamlet. This is a very interesting article about the history of the phrase "straws in one's hair" that's well worth reading.
Because my hair is in its entirety rather akin to straw, it is very easy for me to portray the March Hare as a bonus in this post. I already had the white shirt, red jacket (cardigan), and a cravat in place of a tie, so I merely had to flip my pony tail over my head and let the scraggly straw-like hairs dangle madly over my forehead. Coincidentally (or not???), this March Hare-do doubles as my Boris Johnson impersonation.
Now for the best part of every Style Imitating Art post: revealing our Rabbit Imitating Art selection! I promise I really did think this through, but come on, how could I not choose a white rabbit?! I'm actually not entirely sure which breed of rabbit this is, though if I were to guess, I'd say a New Zealand because the New Zealand white is the prototypical "white rabbit" in my view. This particular white rabbit is called a "ruby-eyed white" (aka REW) as a reference to the eerie eye color that results when a rabbit is completely devoid of melanin pigment (aka albino). The red/pink you can see in the rabbit comes not from pigment but from blood vessels.
It was all very well and good for young humans to have dreams of a land where whimsical and nonsensical things might happen, but it caused no end of difficulty and irritation for the creatures who got caught up in the madness. Take the simple task of getting oneself to work on time so that one's head could remain firmly attached to one's neck. Time was that a rabbit could simply wake up and hop directly to work in mere minutes. But once that Alice girl started fantasizing about her "world of my own," life became much more complicated.
To start with, it dictated a quite time-consuming dress code for the commuting rabbit, even if one were to forgo the shoes and hat and trousers. The shirt, the waistcoat, the jacket, the cravat, the pocket watch, the umbrella - it took time to clothe oneself in these garments that were not by any means designed with a rabbit's anatomy in mind. The Victorian gentleman's raiment was stiff and unforgiving as well, which slowed down one's travels, and since one's boss was even more stiff and unforgiving, and had an executioner on hand besides, the entire situation was quite trying.
Oh to live freely without outrageous clothing or watches...to present oneself naturally as a rabbit in the wild. I can imagine how stately I would look clad head to toe solely in luxurious white fur. Muscular, athletic, angular, alert...a white rabbit in his prime of life! The does would be as mad as March Hares with thoughts of getting straws in their fur rolling about in the... Oh dear, oh dear.
Thanks for joining me today for this Style Imitating Art + Rabbit Imitating (and Improving) Art post!
To see other outfit interpretations of this artwork, check out the review on Shelbee on the Edge.
Wondering how an AI would create drawings in the John Tenniel style for every single sentence in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland? This website lets you generate illustrations in the manner of Tenniel and several other artists simply by clicking on a sentence in the text. For example, this is an image of Alice's cat Dinah à la Tenniel for the line: "Dinah'll miss me very much tonight, I should think! (Dinah was the cat.) I hope they'll remember her saucer of milk at tea-time." Dinah looks very dainty and darling in this drawing. It's the sweet pre-Wonderland Dinah the cat.
Here's another version of Dinah using the same sentence, but she's got a bit of a weird Cheshire Cat-ness to her smile, don't you think? And she's definitely getting her fur wet from leaning too far into the milk. It's the creepy post-Wonderland Dinah the Cheshire-ish cat.
Are you a fan of the Alice books/movies/stories? Do you have a favorite character? How would the White Rabbit inspire you?
Blogs I link up with are listed here.
Sally, very informational post about The White Rabbit!! I love the history of how things came to be and your post does not disappoint. <3 Your hubby looks wonderful in both versions of his White Rabbit outfits. I pinned several photos to Fun & Funky Fashions (for men and women, this time!) as well as SYS under my French Ethereal (I need to split it back out on its own, one day). Pinned your artwork, too. Funny how you began the ending of your post with the risqué rabbits in March... I was laughing! Umm, I think my own parents had their own March Madness as two of us were born in January, lol. ;)
Happy to have shared your…
This was fun! I love the appearance of your special guest in the same posture as the rabbit! Well done! And he is a good sport!
www.chezmireillefashiontravelmom.com
I love how you're able to pull pieces together from your wardbrobe for SIA. I also loved the Unbirthday present of the scarf to complete the look and stay on theme.
Thank you for joining in with #pocolo
Bravo to your husband for joining in. And I knew you'd rock this prompt!!! OXOX Jodie
I loved that post because I also love Alice and I think both you and your husband did a great job with the challenge! My first thought when I saw the white rabbit was a German Giant (or Continental Giant) which isn't a surprise with me being German ;-) How interesting about the straw in the hair, too! I read the article and learned something new, thanks :-) Cat https://catswire.blogspot.com/