Dita Von Teese

Dita Von Teese (born Heather Renée Sweet on September 28, 1972 in Rochester, Michigan) is a popular American burlesque artist, and is generally credited as helping to revive the burlesque scene. Dita Von Teese was born in a small town in Michigan and raised in a historic antique-filled home. Her mother was a manicurist and her father was a machinist. Her fascination with 1940s cinema and classic retro style began at a young age and was fostered by her mother, who would buy clothes for Dita to dress up in. Her mother was a fan of old, Golden-era Hollywood films, and it was from her that Dita developed a fascination with the actresses of that day, especially Betty Grable, an actress that, to this day, she frequently cites as her favourite. She was classically trained as a ballet dancer from age five, and danced solo at age thirteen for a local ballet company. Though she originally wanted to be a ballerina, Dita states that "By 15 I was as good as I’d ever be". She was later to incorporate this element into her burlesque shows, where she frequently goes en pointe. At age twelve, she moved out west from Michigan to Orange County, with her parents and her two sisters. Shortly after this, her father left her mother. As a teenager, Dita's mother took her to buy her first bra, made from plain white cotton, and gave her a plastic egg containing a pair of wrinkly, flesh-coloured tights. The young Dita was very disappointed; she had been hoping to receive beautiful lacy garments and stockings, as she had glimpsed in her father's Playboys. This fuelled her passion for lingerie, and she soon worked in a lingerie store, when she was fifteen, as a salesgirl and, eventually, buyer. This was where she was to get her first corset. In college, she studied historic costuming and had aspirations to work as a stylist for period films. She is a trained costume designer. She began her career in a local strip club when she was nineteen. Disappointed with how unoriginal all the other strippers' acts were, Dita created a vintage-inspired look, with bee-hive hairstyle and elbow-length gloves, both confusing and fascinating to the clientele. Dita later became a fetish model and, finally, a burlesque star. Her retro pin-up look, frequently emulating Bettie Page in photo shoots, set her apart from most other fetish models of the day. Her official website, often referred to as one of the first model sites on the internet, was created back in 1992. She was featured in Playboy magazine in 1999, 2001 and 2002. It was her Playboy cover in December of 2002, that was to give her her name. Originally known simply as 'Dita', Playboy insisted she use a last name. She picked "Von Treese" out of the phonebook, but it was misspelled "Von Teese". Dita, preferring the typo, adopted it as her name. Dita says that it is her appearances in Playboy that finally won her father's respect for her profession. Von Teese has always been fond of wearing elaborate lingerie such as corsets and stockings from a very young age, and, in her words, "puts the tease back into striptease" with long, complex, elaborate dance shows complete with props and characters, often inspired by 1930s and 1940s musicals and films, of which she is a fan. Some famous dances of hers include a feather fan dance, and numbers involving a carousel horse, a giant powder compact, a filigree heart and a claw-toe bathtub with a working showerhead. Her signature show features a giant martini glass. She has also been known to act. In her early years she appeared in fetish-related movies, such as Romancing Sara, Matter of Trust, in which she is billed as Heather Sweet, and also in two films by Andrew Blake: Pin Ups 2 and Decadence. In recent years she has appeared in more mainstream features, such as the 2005 short film, The Death of Salvador Dali, written by Delaney Bishop, a film that won best screenplay, best cinematography, and best Actress for Dita Von Teese at recent festivals, including SXSW, Raindance Film Festival, Denmark Film Festival and Mill Valley Film Festival. She is also due to appear in the upcoming Saint Francis full-length film. In recent years the mainstream modeling world has become more accepting of her. Dita is a common fixture in the front row of the audience at fashion shows, particularly Moschino and Marc Jacobs, labels she is often seen wearing. In the 2006 Milan Fashion Week, Dita was on the catwalk, opening the Moschino diffusion label, Moschino Cheap & Chic, autumn/winter 2006/7 show. She has also modeled for former-club kid Richie Rich's fashion label, Heatherette for Los Angeles Fashion Week, Spring 2004. Additionally, she became the face of Australian clothing range Wheels and Dollbaby for their 2006/7 Spring/Summer advertising campaign. Thanks to her timeless sense of style, she has appeared in Vanity Fair, Vogue, Elle, and international issues of nearly every fashion magazine. Despite this, Dita states that she never uses a stylist: "The one time I hired a stylist, they picked up a pair of my 1940s shoes and said, "These would look really cute with jeans." I immediately said, 'You’re out of here.'" She does her own make-up, and dyes her naturally blonde hair to her signature black herself at home, using Revlon 10-minute dye. Dita's book about this history of burlesque and fetish, Burlesque and the Art of the Teese/Fetish and the Art of the Teese, was published in 2006 by HarperCollins, and was met with excellent reviews. Vanity Fair called her "a Burlesque Superheroine." Musician Marilyn Manson had been a long-time fan of Dita's, and was a member of her website. He first met her when he asked her to dance in one of his music videos. She could not for various reasons, but the two kept in contact. On Manson's 32nd birthday, in 2001[2], she turned up with a bottle of absinthe, and they have been together ever since. On December 3, 2005, they were married, in a non-denominational ceremony at Gurteen Castle in Kilsheelan (County Tipperary), Ireland, the home of their friend, Gottfried Helnwein. The wedding was officiated by surrealist film director and comic book writer Alejandro Jodorowsky. They reportedly exchanged vows in front of approximately 60 guests, including burlesque sensation Catherine D'lish, Lisa Marie Presley, Eric Szmanda, Jessicka of Jack Off Jill and Christian Hejnal of Scarling. She wore a royal purple silk taffeta gown, custom-made by Vivienne Westwood plus a tri-corned hat and matching Mr. Pearl corset. The reception music was provided by the retro German band "Palast Orchester mit Max Raabe" who are known for their spot-on remakes of novelty songs of the Weimar period. The wedding pictures appeared in the May 2006 edition of Vogue under the heading "The Bride Wore Purple". They currently reside in their home in Hollywood with their two Devon Rex cats, Lily and Aleister, and two dachshunds, Greta and Eva.
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