Ballet Archives

  Photo Credit: Sadler's Wells teenage dancer Margot Fonteyn in Frederick Ashton's Apparitions, 1936 costume by Cecil Beaton from Ballerina Fashions Modern Muse by Patricia Mears Margot Fonteyn, born Peggy Hookham to an English Father and a Brazilian mother, grew up in her native London, England, and Shanghai, China, when her family moved there. In both countries, Fonteyn took ballet lessons. She continued to pursue ballet when she moved back to England with her mother. Fonteyn's mother, Hilda Hookham, enrolled her daughter in the Vic-Wells Ballet School, which Ninette De Valois founded. The press noted how involved Fonteyn's Mother was in her career growing up directing her. The British Press knew she was a critical figure for Fonteyn's career.  Margot Fonteyn was open to learning and influence in the industry. Ninette De Valois saw Fonteyn was excellent at taking direction and used this to make her into one of the leading British ballerinas. Valois saw this type o

Photo Credit: Margot Fonteyn wears a silver-gray silk taffeta Christian Dior dress on her wedding day, February 1955 from Ballerina Fashion's Modern Muse Consultant Patricia Mears Margot Fonteyn had great technical control in her dancing while embodying elegance and grace. She embraced the traditions of ballet, but she was also one for modern fashion. When Sadler's Wells went on a tour of the United States and Canada in 1949, the ballet company featured not just what was British ballet but also high fashion in London. The ISLFD, which stood for the Incorporated Society of London Fashion Designers. The ISLFD used their tour as a marketing tool. The company created clothes for the dancers and special garments created for Margot Fonteyn, Pamela May, Beryl Grey, and Moira Shearer. These dancers performed performances on a hectic schedule and took part in photoshoots for American magazines and newspapers. Cecil Beaton even photographed Fonteyn for the magazine Vogue where she wore a

Photo Credit: Margot Fonteyn & Rudolf Nureyev dancing from Ballet The Definitive Illustrated Story Consultant Viviana Durante   Most ballerinas at the time retired at forty, but Margot Fonteyn changed that when she met dancer Rudolf Nureyev, a young Soviet dancer that defected during the Kirov Ballet tour. Ninette de Valois suggested Margot Fonteyn become the dance partner of Nureyev, but Fonteyn was troubled by the age difference between Nureyev and herself. "De Valois told me that Rudolf would dance Giselle at Covent Garden in February, three months ahead. "Do you want to do it with him?" She asked. My Immediate reaction was to say. 'Oh my goodness! I think it would be like mutton dancing with a lamb. Don't you think I'm too old?" Quote from Margot Fonteyn on her memory of how she got to be the dance partner of Nureyev. Eventually though Margot Fonteyn had a change of heart with the advice she got from Ninette De Valois she agreed to dance with Nur

  Photo Credit- Margot Fonteyn as Odette from Swan Lake, 1951, Royal Ballet from Ballet The Definitive Illustrated Story  Consultant- Viviana Durante Margot Fonteyn was a phenomenal ballet dancer of the Royal Ballet in London and a global star, but did you know she was also a brilliant ballet history historian? One of the books she presented and collaborated on was on her favorite ballet dancer who inspired her: Anna Pavlova, and Fonteyn warmly explains how Pavlova's words affected her. Ballet history was one of Margot Fonteyn's deepest passions, and why she, other than Pavlova, is one of my most significant role models and inspirations because she saw how vital historical preservation was in ballet history. A view I share. "These words have such a clear, clean aura of truth that I feel they are an important key to the woman and artist I hold above all others in the long history of ballet. After all, from what does an artist create his art if not from things seen, heard, t