Just so I get my Blanchett cred, let me just say that I love everything about Cate Blanchett. She’s one of the coolest ladies around, she’s an amazing actress, a great mom, a true artist, and before today, a nearly flawless style icon. Cate likes high-fashion – she likes to make an impact, and you can tell that she simply loves to dress. But this dress… oh, NO. Just no, honey.

This is Cate appearing as the “guest of honor” at an exhibition opening in Melbourne. This is her first public appearance since her Streetcar Named Desire costar accidently bashed in her head with an old-timey radio. So is this crocheted quilt dress a product of a traumatic head injury? Or was it just the one “freebie” bad call Cate gets after a lifetime of being flawless?

There have been some awful red carpet faux-pas over the years, but Cate Blanchett’s latest outing in Melbourne takes the biscuit.

The Australian actress, 40, was guest of honour at the opening of the new exhibition Screen Worlds: The Story of Film, Television and Digital Culture.

But all eyes were on her bizarre crocheted dress, which looked more like a nanna’s winter bed cover than something you’d actually wear.

The odd one-shoulder number left many of her waiting fans with confused and surprised looks on their faces.

She told reporters the exhibition was thrilling, although it was her bizarre choice of outfit that ended up stealing the show – for all the wrong reasons.

Cate appeared to have recovered from a recent head injury which she picked while acting in the stage production of A Streetcar Named Desire, in Sydney.

She was injured during a fight scene with her co-star, Joel Edgerton, when he accidentally struck her with a radio. An audience member described seeing blood streaming down the actress’ neck before the play was halted ‘due to technical difficulties’.

It is hoped the exhibition will help to confirm Melbourne as Australia’s home of screen culture.

Australian Premier John Brumby said the show, held at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, brings together ‘rarely seen footage, fascinating objects and interactive displays from cinema’s early beginnings to the rise of television, games, the internet and the dominance of the digital age’.

Cate was joined by Matrix actor Hugo Weaving at the opening of the exhbition, which includes a 1896 Lumiere Cinematographe camera/projector, the rocket clock from Play School, and costumes from Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge.

[From the Daily Mail]

Well, she got noticed. For all the wrong reasons. Did Cate think she wouldn’t make an impact at this event unless she wore something horrible? Or did she think this dress was just stunning. I can’t even justify this with a “maybe it just photographs horribly” – I’m pretty sure it sucked in person too. Oh, Cate. I just can’t hate you. This God awful dress has given me so much pleasure.