With a career that spans 6 decades Pierre Cardin has to be considered one of the most inventive and influential fashion designers of the 20th century. In 1945 he was working at the house of Madame Paquin, later leaving it to join Marcelle Chaumont, who was Madame Vionnet’s assistant. In the following years he worked with [ Read More ]
American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity is the first Costume Institute exhibition drawn from the newly established Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at the Met. It explores developing perceptions of the modern American woman from 1890 to 1940 and how they have affected the way American women are seen today. Focusing on archetypes of American femininity [ Read More ]
I came across this fantastic little book the other day while shopping at my favorite antiques mall. In this book, entitled – “Fashion’s Folly”, the authors intent was to mock and poke fun at fashion, fashion magazines and fashion photography of the time. The time was 1954 and I’ll let the authors explain their motivations [ Read More ]
Check out this newsreel from the 1930’s depicting imagined fashions for the year 2000. Aside from being a campy trip into the future, it seems to me that, most of the predictions are off the mark with only a few alluding to things actually going on today. Many of the fashions depicted are obviously rooted [ Read More ]
I have been collecting Betty Cooke jewelry since the early 1980s and have always been attracted to the elegance and simplicity of her designs, which gives her jewelry a timeless quality.
Betty has been designing jewelry since she graduated from the Maryland Institute in 1946. Back then she and her husband, Bill Steinmetz, renovated a house [ Read More ]
On a recent trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC I came across a fascinating and unique display of antique ethnic gold jewelry from the Island of Java in Indonesia. All of the pieces in the exhibition originated from the 8th to the early 10th century and they provide a fascinating glimpse into [ Read More ]
A native of The Dominican Republic, Francisco Rebajes emigrated to the US in the early 1920’s. In the early 1930’s, while the nation was in the grips of the great depression, Rebajes was selling his small hand made metal sculptures on the streets of New York just to survive. Then one day, at the famous [ Read More ]
After searching major craft shows for years, I finally made my find.
While most contemporary craft jewelry is fairly similar in style, Lisa & Scott Cylinder’s jewelry is exciting and innovative, which touched my soul. Their jewelry from beginning to end finishes well, like a good book. From their creativity & [ Read More ]
Hair combs have been around for centuries and have been used in all parts of the world. The earliest hair combs were made of bone, ivory and wood. Eventually materials such as silver, tin and brass were also used.
Later in time, during the 19th century, tortoise shell and bone hair combs came into favor. Besides [ Read More ]
With a career that spans 6 decades Pierre Cardin has to be considered one of the most inventive and influential fashion designers of the 20th century.
In 1945 he was working at the house of Madame Paquin, later leaving it to join Marcelle Chaumont, who was Madame Vionnet’s assistant. In the following years he worked with [ Read More ]
It’s the roaring 20’s, the Jazz Age. The world is going through a momentous change. WW1 has just ended, the middle class is on the rise and women are beginning to assert a new found independence. Fashion gets swept along with all this change and starts going through a revolution of its own. The [ Read More ]
American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity is the first Costume Institute exhibition drawn from the newly established Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at the Met. It explores developing perceptions of the modern American woman from 1890 to 1940 and how they have affected the way American women are seen today. Focusing on archetypes of American femininity [ Read More ]
The Memorial Day holiday has just passed ushering in the true summer season. Light weight and simple clothing is generally the norm for this time of year. How great to be able to liven up your wardrobe with a unique statement necklace. The trends are all over the place this season but I’ve picked out [ Read More ]
I just found a great Jantzen wool bathing suit from the 1930’s and for some reason, maybe because of the warmer weather, I can’t get swim wear out of my mind. Even though I did a brief tour of swim wear in my last post I thought it might be fun to surf around Etsy [ Read More ]
