The “It Girl” Wars in Renaissance Italy

Her marital status did not prevent the brothers Giuliano and Lorenzo di Piero de’ Medici from fighting over her affections and she was an inspiration to many artists, including Sandro Botticelli. Some even believe she was the inspiration for Venus in The Birth of Venus, although because this painting was painted around 1485, about 10 years after her tragically premature death at the age of 22 in 1476, it was an idealized portrayal of her. But since Botticelli was so enamored with her that he asked to be buried at her feet after his death, it is very likely that he actually kept her image in his mind all those years.

The fashion iconography that followed in its wake came to prominence during the Italian Wars, a series of largely violent struggles fought by Spain and France for control of Italy that raged from 1494 to 1559. Fashion was often used as a diplomatic tool, and Isabella d’Este, wife of Francesco II Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, was particularly skilled in these arts.

A famous patron and collector of the arts, Isabella was one of the most famous women of Renaissance Italy. Her innovative style choices spread her reputation as a trendsetter across Europe, but for her fashion was not just a frivolous hobby. Referred to as “Machiavelli in skirts,” by an early twentieth-century historian, a somewhat misogynistic statement that nonetheless underscores the level of her influence. Her stylistic choices were “deeply rooted in statecraft strategies,” says historian Sarah Cockram, who has written extensively about Isabella.

Renaissance-style warfare

Communicating political loyalty through clothing was well understood in Renaissance Italy, but it was often a risky business. When Isabella’s brother-in-law, Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, sent her a luxurious fabric embroidered with Sforza’s motifs in 1492, she immediately made a dress out of it to show her affiliation with him while she was in Milan. However, when seven years later the King of France expelled Ludovico from Milan and Isabella’s affair with him raised doubts about her loyalty to France, she sought to reassure the French ambassador, through her envoy in Venice, that if he visited her he would find her dressed in French liss from head to toe.

Her reputation as a sophisticated arbiter of taste was also often leveraged for political influence, as gift-giving was used to gain the favor of her superiors, and to arouse a desire to meet her needs in those below her. Isabella’s scented gloves seem to have been a particularly powerful source of influence, as the Queen of France was desperate to obtain a pair. “What you want, if you are to survive the Italian Wars, is to be favorably in the mind of the King of France and what is more intimate than to be at the hand of the Queen of France?” says Cockram.