Triumph or travesty Livia Firth Eco/Vintage Oscars dress?

There has been a bit of a twitter uproar, to say the least in regards to Livia dress at the Oscars. A keen purveyor of ethical & sustainable fashion, Colin Firth's wife has undertaken a 'Green carpet challenge', whereby she will only where items considered ethical or green which she then documents on her Vogue Blog. From can-ring-pull bags to fully customised items, her dresses and accessories of choice for such prestigious events have always stood out and represented her moral angle. 

For her imminent Oscars dress, consideration were in full swing months before and the designer of choice was East End Gary Harvey renowned for his sustainable collections. The Oscars being, one of the most esteemed events of the year and The Kings Speech predictably taking center stage, all lights and flashbulbs will be bountifully facing in her direction, her dress was always going to be a focal point and a major notch in her green-carpet challenge. 

A selection of the 11 vintage pieces used to make Livia's dress.

So who are you wearing?.... The question asked by Journalists doing the rounds on the red-carpet on Oscars night...

The concept behind her dress as Livia revealved, "Eleven dresses in one, vintage/thrift/charity shop buys all from the era of The King's Speech", At first I must say I thought wow what an incredible idea and to link it with the decade of The King's Speech (1930's) is a nice touch and then.... as I mentioned before the flood of shocked tweets asking the question how could she?.... how could she butcher 11 vintage dresses just just make one? 

If this was 20+ years ago most people would of not battered an eyelid if someone decided to cut up some vintage pieces, but now with the histieria that surrounds vintage and the rarity of finding garments which age such as the 1920's/30's pieces you cannot deny why people objected.  Yes indeed she looked extremely beautiful however I also cannot help but think that what is now going to happen to this one dress? I cannot image her donning such a stand-out piece again for any awards ceromony so has this now one dress made of 11 to promote stunistainbility infact reversed the idea by the lack of wear?  

I also think the design lends itself more so to that of a wedding dress, which in my eyes would be an item to treasure and pass down generations, and therefore the idea or remodeling 11 other dresses would of been a worth while task in that case. when I first heard her renounce the origins of her dress I assumed they may of been 11 well-worn, unusable 1930's dresses which were then transformed into a wearable piece, to me that made perfect sense however when I began to explore her blog and discover that some of the dresses appeared to be almost immaculate, it seemed such a shame cut away from the original/classic design and instead create a rather generic looking 'wedding-esque' gown... I would love to know what you think or feel in regards to Livia's choice of Oscar dress?

Vintage in it's original form did feature on the Oscar carpet elsewhere, and although not as prevelan or as memorable as say Julia Roberts Vintage Valentino (2001) moment and Resse Witherspoon intricate Vintage Dior gown (2006), this year there was still undertones of it... see below the gallery of vintage starlets. 

Although both ladies in their retrospective vintage frocks did not win over any critics they did however fly the vintage flag for the evening with Marisa Tomei in vintage Charles James and Elizabeth Banks chose Vintage Versace to wear to the Vanity Fair Oscar Party

Then to the almost vintage but not quite gallery...

 Anne Hathaways pre-show Oscars dress was 'Valentino Archive' from 2002, Florence Welch also in Valentino Couture, the dress was more than a little vintage inspired. And last but by no means least Hailee Steinfeld wowed the crowd in a specially designed, 50's inspired Marchesa gown again praised for her age appropriate dress she again looked so beautiful and classic she could show a few 'olders' (mentioning no names) how it is done.