Mata Hari's dance costume

Tall, dusky and not especially beautiful, but irresistibly attractive nonetheless. An electrifying personality with a knack for attracting publicity. Margaretha Zelle, who was born in a house on De Kelders, a canal in Leeuwarden in 1876, was a full-blown sensation in Paris before she turned 30. She bewitched high society with her exotic dances which usually involved her slowly removing her clothes. Newspapers devoted endless column inches to the mysterious Mata Hari, Margaretha Zelle’s stage name. For ten years, the name ‘Mata Hari’ was synonymous with excitement, glamour and sensuality. However, her numerous, very public affairs with men in uniform – of many different nationalities – aroused the suspicions of the secret services, and during the First World War, Mata Hari was executed by a firing squad in the forests around Paris.
Costumes such as this were Margaretha’s trademark. Her hair was lavishly coiffured and she always wore a selection of exotic jewellery. She wore this glittering brassiere in combination with the translucent veils that she wound around her body.