On The Violet Hour

The violet hour, the magic hour, l’heure bleu, the witching hour, or simply dusk: the name, taken from T. S. Eliot’s seminal poem, The Wasteland, refers to the time between day and night, just as the sun has set and it is no longer day but not quite night, and anything can happen. Outside, the sky is alive with color. As the sun’s last rays slip beneath the horizon, vivid hues of the rainbow shoot across the falling sky. Magenta, marigold, coral, turquoise, cobalt and violet: the sky is a riot of color until the growing dark envelops it from the east, and at last, it is night.

The violet hour is the hour full of wonder and beauty and possibility, when the night ahead still holds the promise of adventure. It is the time just before the party begins, when beautiful girls and glamorous women are dressing for the dance, the date or the dinner. The hour is steeped in anticipation and butterflies in the stomach, and the air is filled with hope and the smell of perfume. Atomizers spritz; dresses are changed, and changed again; necklaces, bracelets, earrings and rings are added, removed, then added again; phones and keys and cash and lipstick are stuffed into small bags all in the last rush out the door as your date waits, the taxi blows his horn, and your husband calls after you. The last glimmer of color disappears into the darkness and at last, the night has begun . . . and anything, truly, is possible.

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All website photography by Robert Shaw.