Israeli Beauty Queen Will Be Dressed to the Mines
Galit Levi may be the queen of hyped couture.
The young Tel Aviv designer is fast earning a name for herself as the purveyor of outlandish and flashy clothes that make more than the usual fashion statement.
Her newest creation will go on display later this week when Miss Israel dons Levi’s diamond-encrusted bulletproof vest-and-gown for the annual Miss Universe competition, held this year in Puerto Rico.
“This dress shows that even though the situation is very bad, we continue to go on with our lives,” Levi, 29, said from the boutique she owns on Tel Aviv’s trendy Dizengoff Boulevard.
“We go to weddings, we go to parties, everything we want to do,” she said. “Of course, if things continue going the way they are now, you’ll need this kind of dress to go to the parties.”
Levi was referring to the last seven months of escalating violence between Israel and the Palestinians. The two sides are locked in a relentless battle of shootings, bombings and shelling that has claimed more than 500 lives and plunged the region into chaotic despair.
But life, in some form, does go on, and this is what Levi wants to emphasize. In its own trivial way, topping a fancy dress with an equally fancy flak jacket symbolizes the Israeli determination to cope, persevere in the face of conflict and adjust one’s daily existence--what Israelis see as their time-tested esprit de corps.
Or maybe it’s another form of escapism.
“The Israelis who live in this country, we are used to these situations,” Levi said. “We have quiet for five, six, seven years, then boom. We hope for something different, but this is the situation. There are people who are afraid and don’t go to malls and won’t be in areas with a lot of people. But the rest of us work and go out and have families.”
Levi sewed about 2,000 diamonds onto a standard army-issue flak vest and into the accompanying camouflage-colored silk gown. It will be worn by Israeli beauty queen Ilanit Levy, an 18-year-old soldier from the city of Haifa, in Friday’s Miss Universe pageant.
As these things go, Levi has a successful track record. Her gowns have been worn by two recent Miss Israels, including one who went on to win the Miss World crown. And the Israeli transsexual pop singer Dana International wore a Levi creation in the 1998 Eurovision Song Contest. The entertainer won the high-profile competition.
At her busy boutique, Levi also peddles wedding gowns and other women’s apparel, in a style that a local magazine once called a combination of “Dynasty,” “Spartacus” and “Star Trek.” She is exploring the possibility of opening stores in Los Angeles and New York.
The dress that Levi designed for the 1999 Miss Israel made quite a splash. Its bodice was covered in a huge sequined blue Star of David, a symbol of Israel, above an exposed midriff. Ironically, the Miss Israel who wore it, Rana Raslan, was the first Israeli Arab ever to win the national pageant. Her family was reportedly scandalized.
The year before, Levi’s design stood in marked contrast to this season’s body-armor ensemble. The dress worn by Miss Israel Linor Abargil was emblazoned with the famous picture of former President Clinton coaxing a handshake from the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
The 1993 scene was a landmark of the Oslo peace process, which has collapsed amid bloodshed and hatred.
“I was very happy [three] years ago to design a dress that showed peace,” Levi said. “And this year I designed a dress that shows war.”
