By Nik Bentel Studio
The Botticelli Dress
When the Renaissance painter, Sandro Botticelli, created the Birth of Venus in 1486, he accidentally became a fashion designer. Nearly 500 years later in 2021, Nik Bentel decided to recreate the dress, cloak, and chemise featured upon the Hora of Spring. Positioned at the right of Boticelli's masterpiece, is one of the three Horae (Hours)––the Greek minor goddesses of the seasons, the natural order, and the attendants of Venus. Boticelli's floral decoration upon her dress, suggests that she is the Hora of Spring. In extracting the Hora's elemental dress from this painting, Bentel gives Boticelli's mastery new life and meaning, and allows one to become the Hora of Spring themself.
Selected Press
The extravagantly decorated dress and the beautiful robe that she is holding out to Venus are embroidered with white and red daisies, blue cornflowers and yellow primroses - all spring flowers which suggest birth. She wears a garland of myrtle--the tree of Venus--and a sash of pink roses, as worn by the goddess Flora in Botticelli's other painting Primavera .
The laurel wreath worn by the Hora are punning references to the name "Lorenzo", though it is uncertain whether it was referencing Lorenzo il Magnifico, the effective ruler of Florence, or his young cousin Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco that is being referenced. In the same way the flowers in the air around Zephyr and on the textiles worn and carried by the Hora evoke the name of Florence.
A Limited Edition Dress
Once it is sold out, there will not be any more made. The Botticelli Dress is the second project of a series of storytelling products to be released sequentially every few weeks by Bentel.
Behind the Project
Coming soon!