This ballet brought Marie Taglioni before the French public. She was the first to dance "en pointe". She did this for artistic reasons rather than spectacle. She was also the first to wear the white, bell-shaped, calf-length ballet skirt. This skirt is now considered an essential feature of the romantic ballet. Poet and critic Théophile Gautier attended the first performance of "La Sylphide". His ideas for "Giselle" would show touches of "La Sylphide" ten years later. It would be set in a real place and in the past, for example, and would be about everyday people and supernatural women.