V&A

Coral Quilted Silk Jacket with Gold Lamé Skirt

1970s · 1970s · British

Designer

Bill Gibb

Production

haute couture

Material

quilted silk with metallic lamé

Culture

British

Movement

Ethnic Revival · Disco

Influences

Japanese kimono construction · 1970s ethnic revival

This evening ensemble features a coral-red quilted silk jacket with wide kimono-style sleeves and an open front construction that reveals a fitted bodice underneath. The jacket displays intricate hand-embroidered details in metallic threads creating geometric and possibly floral motifs across the surface. The accompanying skirt is constructed from bronze-gold lamé fabric with vertical pleating or gathering that creates a column-like silhouette extending to floor length. The ensemble exemplifies 1970s evening wear's embrace of exotic influences and rich textural contrasts, combining the structured quilting technique with the fluid drape of metallic fabric. The jacket's loose, robe-like construction over a fitted foundation reflects the era's layered approach to formal dressing.

dressa-linesquare necklinefloor length

Connected To

Coral Quilted Silk Jacket with Gold Lamé Skirt

64%

Yellow Wool Mantle Lined with Silk Chiffon

Influences·Japanese kimono construction

SHARED60 years · cross-culture · cross-category

Both garments borrow the kimono's genius for transforming a rectangle of fabric into pure sculptural drama through strategic wrapping and draping. The 1970s British ensemble channels this through its boxy, straight-armed jacket that sits like armor over the pleated lamé skirt, while the Belle Époque French mantle achieves the same effect with its enveloping cocoon silhouette and that decisive wrap-and-tie closure.

Echoes Across Time

1970s → Belle Epoque · 60yr64%

SHARED

Influences·Japanese kimono construction

Navy Blue Wool Bolero Jacket with Gold Trim

Victorian Late / Bustle → 1970s

Pull the Thread→

Follow this garment wherever the graph leads

THE MET

Victorian Late / Bustle · 1860s-1880s

V&A

1970s · 1970s

Navy Blue Wool Bolero Jacket with Gold Trim

61%

Coral Quilted Silk Jacket with Gold Lamé Skirt

Worn with·fitted bodiceTechnique·hand-embroidery

SHARED90 years · cross-culture · cross-category

These two jackets speak the same ornamental language across nearly a century: both deploy gold embellishment as strategic punctuation against richly colored grounds, framing the body with deliberate precision. The Victorian bolero's metallic thread embroidery traces the same aesthetic impulse as the 1970s jacket's lamé accents—both designers understood that luxury lives in the details that catch light along edges and seams.

Text63%

Image77%

Entity30%

Silver Black Sequined Mini Dress

57%

Coral Quilted Silk Jacket with Gold Lamé Skirt

Movement·DiscoFunction·formal-evening

SHARED50 years · cross-culture

Both garments pulse with the same disco-era hunger for light-catching drama, but they arrive there through completely different routes. The silver sequined mini attacks with full-frontal sparkle—every inch designed to fracture light on the dance floor—while the coral and gold ensemble takes a more architectural approach, using the quilted jacket's geometric stitching and the lamé skirt's metallic sheen to create a sophisticated interplay of texture and gleam.

Text56%

Image65%

Entity25%

Coral Quilted Silk Jacket with Gold Lamé Skirt

55%

Cream Satin Cloche Hat with Black Swirl Design

Movement·DiscoFunction·formal-evening

SHAREDsame era · cross-culture · cross-category

Both garments pulse with disco's unapologetic maximalism — the jacket's coral quilting catches light like armor plating while the cloche's black swirls seem to spin with the mirror ball. The forty-year gap between them reveals how disco's visual language transcended race and geography: that same hunger for surface drama, whether quilted silk that moves like liquid metal or satin that turns a simple hat into a hypnotic vortex.

Text62%

Image74%

Entity24%