Tatiana's Physical Appearance

[katherine2001]

Hazel eyes will look different depending on what you are wearing.  My eyes are green with brown and gold in them, and when I wear one of those colors, it will bring out that color in my eyes.  That is why I think Tatiana may have had hazel eyes.

[Selencia]

I am having a little trouble with this, but who do you think Tatiana took after in the looks department? This is not an "oh she is so pretty" thread, I am just trying to figure out where Tatiana's rather exotic looks came from.

[RealAnastasia]

I think we discussed it a lot of times. I've read she had an "Eastern exotic beauty", very Russian...But in fact, most of us noticed that she had a distinct ressemblance to her paternal Grandmother, the Empress Maria Alexandrovna, wife of Alexander II. Of course, she was not Russian, nor an exotic Eastern lady , but a German princess. She was born as Marie of Hesse , and if you look at hger closely, you'll see Tatiana's physical features on her.

RealAnastasia.

[Rodney_G.]

I think Empress Maria Alexandrovna, wife of Alexander II , was Tatiana's paternal great- Grandmother.

[Sarushka]

FYI -- I've just merged three similar threads dealing with Tatiana's appearance and resemblance to Marie Alexandrovna.

[Natasha]

“the grand duchess tatiana was as charming as her sister olga, but in a different way. she has been described as proud, but i never knew anyone less so. with her, as her mother, shyness and reserve were accounted as pride, but once you knew her and had gained her affection, this reserve disappeared, and the real tatiana became apparent. she was a poetical creature, as always yearning for the ideal, and dreaming of great friendships which might be hers. the emperor loved her devotedly, they had much in common, and the sisters used to laugh, and say that, if a favor were required, ‘tatiana must ask papa to grant it.’ she was very tall, and excessively thin, with a cameo-like profile, deep blue eyes, and dark chestnut hair… a lovely ‘rose’ maiden, fragile and pure as a flower.”

- lili dehn, friend of the tsaritsa

[LauraO]

i always read that tatiana looked like alix and so therefore kind of accepted it. and there are various photos that i must admit at first glance i thought were alix when in fact they were tanya.  but then i heard it mentioned that she resembled her father and only then noticed the massive resemblance. their eyes are almost an exact duplicate imo.

however i think its really odd. whilst if i wrote a list of resemblances she would come out on paper as looking like her father the overall look is still very much alix. mind you i think is anastasia had grown into full womanhood she would have looked a lot like her mother.

for the same reasons i think her features are very much romanov but the look is alix, strange.

i agree with the eyes being hazel. a friend of mine i always thought had brown eyes and i've known them for ages, and then suddenly a few days ago thought, gosh, you've got greeny blue eyes! but then at closer look they were flecked with brown. so its not incoceivable that everyone quoting tanya's eye colour was not mixed up just seeing something differently.

Hazel eyes will look different depending on what you are wearing.  My eyes are green with brown and gold in them, and when I wear one of those colors, it will bring out that color in my eyes.  That is why I think Tatiana may have had hazel eyes.

again i utterly agree with this, its not that a colour just appears some days, its always there but certain colours just draw it out.

[Natasha]

i'm completely color blind, but over the years i've grown a knack for guessing different colors by examining the shade. with black and white photographs it's similar, but even then, exposure and light come into play which can effect the way a color might look. not to mention with photos uploaded to the internet, the images can get distorted. but, i will say, of all the pictures i've seen of tatiana, her eyes have always appeared a deep blue. this is just what i can see, but from having to spend my whole life guessing for colors, her eyes have always looked a dark, grayish blue.

[Selencia]

I have to say that I don't think Tatiana looks like great grandmother. The eyes still aren't there nor did Maria A. have the exotic features of Tatiana. Tat's definitely has Nicholas and Alexandra in there, but I just could never figure out where the exotic look came from.

[blessOTMA]

There is looks like and  then there is resembles ....I believe TN resembles her great grandmother and her Uncle Ernie..the eye shape and the way the crinkle when smiling  etc. At least in this way TN doesn't seem to have come from nowhere!   When I paint Tatiana, I paint an eye in shadow, a deep brown and any part of her eye in sunlight, a light grey. I have seen how the sunlight can effect them. But none can agree!
LD's disribtion is the only one I know that says they were blue....

Buxhoeveden: - dark hair, light brown eyes

Dehn: - "dark chestnut" hair, "deep blue" eyes

Vyrubova:- "rich brown" hair, eyes "so darkly grey" that they appeared "quite black" in the evening

Gillard doesn't even say.....just says she had brown hair! 

 It's quite madding! 

What APFELBLUME  says about reading colour by the diffrent shades found in the b/w photos is very true..one does learn to do it. and I had a interesting experience the other evening sitting on my deck....in the long dusk of this time of year, I suddenly realized that as the sun's light was removed, the colors usually found around me, where like the shades in a b/w photos and corresponds just as I have learned to read them...red appears  dark and blue appeared light etc.The exciting thing is now I can experiment and see how certain colours read in this lack of light and it will help to read the photos . It's not exact of course, but at least it gives clues

[Sarushka]

I think parsing colors from B&W has as much (if not more) to do with saturation than hue. The bright canary yellow on TN's regimental uniform appears almost as dark as the navy blue in B&W, for example.

[blessOTMA]

I frankly think there are two lancer  uniforms... earlier ( solid blue ) and later ( what has come down to us ) if that's possible....such a yellow should have a fairly bright tone  and be very different from the blue even in a b/w photo taken  at  dusk.  imo I can't recall seeing  the yellow V shape piece in the uniforms in the b/w photos...  just in what has been handled down.

[Sarushka]

The yellow is definitely visible in B&W photos of the lancer uniform. It just depends on the quality of the photo:



What's interesting is that the yellow portions are actually darker than the blue.

[blessOTMA]

The yellow is definitely visible in B&W photos of the lancer uniform. It just depends on the quality of the photo:



What's interesting is that the yellow portions are actually darker than the blue.

No. A seperate piece of the uniform,  the V shape, is of course there . But how can yellow look like that next to the  yellow buttons and the light , may even be yellow ,  tassels shoulder boards?  imo it's  not yellow there ....why we have yellow now, I don't know.

If one took a b/w photo of the uniform we have today, it would not look like this...in any light . I believe her last uniform , what we have,  is diffrent from this uniform in the photo . just imo

[Sarushka]

I think we're going to have to agree to disagree, because the different colors are quite plain to me. As for the tassels, belt, etc -- those were white.

At any rate, we're off topic!