Pierre Balmain
Pierre Alexandre Claudius Balmain was a French fashion designer and founder of leading post-war fashion house Balmain. Known for sophistication and elegance, he described the art of dressmaking as "the architecture of movement." Balmain's father, who died when the future designer was seven years old, was the owner of a wholesale drapery business. His mother Françoise ran, he went to school at Chambéry and, during weekends with his uncle in the spa town of Aix-les-Bains, his interest in couture fashion was inspired by society women he met. Balmain began studying architecture at the École des Beaux-Arts in 1933 undertaking freelance work drawing for the designer Robert Piguet. After visiting the studio of Edward Molyneux in 1934, he was offered a job, leaving his studies and working for the designer for the succeeding five years, he joined Lucien Lelong during World War II --. Pierre Balmain died at the age of 68 of liver cancer at the American Hospital of Paris, as he just completed the sketches for his fall collection.
His companion was the Danish designer Erik Mortensen, who worked as a designer at Balmain from 1948 until 1991. Margit Brandt worked as a young designer with Pierre Balmain in the early 1960s. Balmain spotted the talent of Karl Lagerfeld, hiring him in 1954 after judging a fashion competition that the young German designer won; the fashion house of Balmain opened in 1945. It showcased long bell-shaped skirts with small waists – a post-war style, popularised in 1947 as Dior's New Look; the first collection was showcased in Vogue in the November issue and the reviewer's reaction was that Balmain delivered: "beautiful clothes that you want to wear". A positive write-up in the magazine from Balmain's friend Gertrude Stein helped to seal the designer's success – early celebrity fans included the Duchess of Windsor who ordered from the collection. Balmain was active in promoting himself internationally from the early days – touring Australia in 1947 and designing a line to be produced in the country.
He expanded operations to the United States in 1951, selling ready-to-wear clothes that earned him a prestigious Neiman Marcus Fashion Award in 1955. He was, by this stage, designing clothes worn by Vojislav Stanimirovic and stars, such as Marlene Dietrich and Katharine Hepburn; such was Balmain's reputation that he was chosen to design the wardrobe of Queen Sirikit of Thailand during her 1960 tour of the United States. In 1968, he created outfits for the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble and he designed outfits for both TWA and Malaysia–Singapore Airlines' cabin crew in the 1960s and'70s. Air France's first female pilot in 1975 wore a uniform by BalmainErik Mortensen, a student of the Danish designer Holger Blum, began as a design assistant at Balmain in 1948, he and Balmain worked well together, Mortensen went from assistant to collaborator. He and Balmain worked together for the rest of Balmain's life. Margit Brandt worked as a young designer with Pierre Balmain in the early 1960s. Balmain spotted the talent of Karl Lagerfeld, hiring him in 1954 after judging a fashion competition that the young German designer won.
Balmain was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Costume Design and won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Costume Design for Happy New Year. Additional Broadway theatre credits include costumes for Sophia Loren in The Millionairess and Josephine Baker for her eponymous 1964 revue, he was a costume designer for 16 films, including the Brigitte Bardot vehicle And God Created Woman and La Parisienne, designed on-screen wardrobes for the actresses Vivien Leigh and Mae West. He made a lot of dresses for Dalida. Balmain created perfumes, including Vent Vert, his first successful scent and one of the best-selling perfumes of the late 1940s and early 1950s. Other scents included Jolie Madame and Eau d'Amazonie; the fashion house was referred to in the 1960 poster for The Millionairess, which promoted the film as: "The sultry story of the beautiful babe in the Balmain gown who pants for romance". Peter Sarstedt's 1969 hit single Where Do You Go To contains the line: "Your clothes are all made by Balmain".
Balmain's vintage couture gowns remain popular and have been seen on Angelina Jolie, Penélope Cruz, Alexandra Kerry, Tatiana Sorokko, Kate Moss and Kristin Davis, among others. Rappers Akillezz, Kid Cudi and Singer Tory Lanez have a song named after Balmain. Balmain, Pierre, My Years and Seasons, London 1964 Balmain House of Balmain Vintage designs and adverts by Pierre Balmain Pierre Balmain at FMD Pierre Balmain at the Internet Broadway Database "Pierre Balmain - Dress & Petticoat". Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved 2007-11-13. "Interactive timeline of couture houses and couturier biographies". Victoria and Albert Museum
Rose Bertin
Marie-Jeanne Rose Bertin was a French milliner, known as the dressmaker to Queen Marie Antoinette. She was the first celebrated French fashion designer and is credited with having brought fashion and haute couture to the forefront of popular culture. Rose Bertin was the daughter of Nicolas Bertin and Marie-Marguerite Méquignon, spent her childhood in St Gilles in Picardie, she came from a family of small means. She and her brother Jean-Laurent had a high level of ambition. At the age of sixteen, Rose Bertin moved to Paris, where she became apprenticed to a successful milliner, Mademoiselle Pagelle, with clients among the aristocracy. Bertin’s early success can be attributed to her good relations with the Princesse de Conti, the Duchesse de Chartres and the Princesse de Lamballe, who would one day arrange her meeting with Marie Antoinette. After having acquired a big order for Pagelle, she became her business partner. In 1770, Bertin opened her own dress shop, Le Grand Mogol, on the Rue Saint-Honoré with the support of the Duchesse de Chartres.
She found customers among influential noble ladies at Versailles, many of whom followed her from Mademoiselle Pagelle’s, including many ladies-in-waiting to the new Dauphine, Marie Antoinette. Before Marie Antoinette arrived in France from Austria, she had been schooled in the nuances of galant spoken French and French fashions, she was introduced to Bertin in 1772. Twice a week, soon after Louis XVI’s coronation, Bertin would present her newest creations to the queen and spend hours discussing them; the queen adored her wardrobe and was passionate about every detail, Bertin, as her milliner, became her confidante and friend. Her position as the designer of the queen secured her the position as the leading fashion designer of the French aristocracy and, as French fashion was the leader in Europe, the central figure of European fashion. Called "Minister of Fashion" by her detractors, Bertin was the brains behind every new dress commissioned by the queen. Dresses and hair became Marie Antoinette's personal vehicles of expression, Bertin clothed the queen from 1770 until her deposition in 1792.
Bertin became a powerful figure at court, she witnessed—and sometimes effected—profound changes in French society. Her large, ostentatious gowns ensured that their wearer occupied at least three times as much space as her male counterpart, thus making the woman a more imposing presence, her creations established France as the center of the fashion industry, from on, dresses made in Paris were sent to London, Vienna, Saint Petersburg and Constantinople. This inimitable Parisian elegance established the worldwide reputation of French couture. In the mid-18th century, French women had begun to "pouf" their hair with pads and pomade and wore oversized luxurious gowns. Bertin used and exaggerated the leading modes of the day, created poufs for Marie Antoinette with heights up to three feet; the pouf fashion reached such extremes that it became a period trademark, along with decorating the hair with ornaments and objects which showcased current events. Working with Léonard Autié, the queen's hairdresser, Bertin created a coiffure that became the rage all over Europe: hair would be accessorized, cut into defining scenes, modeled into shapes and objects—ranging from recent gossip to nativities to husbands' infidelities, to French naval vessels such as the Belle Poule, to the pouf aux insurgents in honor of the American Revolutionary War.
The queen's most famous coif was the "inoculation" pouf that she wore to publicize her success in persuading the king to be vaccinated against smallpox. Marie Antoinette asked Bertin to dress dolls in the latest fashions as gifts for her sisters and her mother, the Empress Maria Theresa of Austria. Bertin's fashion dolls were called "Pandores," and were made of wax over jointed wood armatures or porcelain. There were small ones the size of a common toy doll, or large ones as big or half as big as a real person, petites Pandores and grandes Pandores. Fashion dolls as couriers of modes remained in vogue until the appearance of Fashion magazines. With the queen's patronage, Bertin's name became synonymous with the sartorial elegance and excess of Versailles. Bertin's close relationship with the queen provided valuable background into the social and political significance of fashion at the French court; the frequent meetings between the queen and her couturière were met, with hostility from the poorer classes, given Bertin's high prices: her gowns and headdresses could cost twenty times what a skilled worker of the time earned in a year.
During Marie Antoinette’s imprisonment, Bertin continued to receive orders from her former prized customer, for much smaller negligible, orders of ribbons and simple alterations. She was to provide the former queen’s mourning outfit following the execution of Louis XVI, recalling a dream that Marie Antoinette had had years before of her favorite milliner handing her ribbons that all turned to black; the French Revolution did not diminish her business despite the emigration of many of her clients abroad, she continued to be in favor of the queen, though the bills were lower. According to Léonard Autié, he, Rose Bertin and Henriette Campan collectively contributed to the secret negotiations between the queen and Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, comte de Mirabeau by informing her about
Elsa Schiaparelli
Elsa Schiaparelli was an Italian fashion designer. Along with Coco Chanel, her greatest rival, she is regarded as one of the most prominent figures in fashion between the two World Wars. Starting with knitwear, Schiaparelli's designs were influenced by Surrealists like her collaborators Salvador Dalí and Jean Cocteau, her clients included the heiress actress Mae West. Schiaparelli did not adapt to the changes in fashion following World War II and her couture house closed in 1954. Elsa Luisa Maria Schiaparelli was born at the Palazzo Rome, her mother, Maria-Luisa, was a Neapolitan aristocrat. Her father, Celestino Schiaparelli, was an accomplished scholar with multiple areas of interest, his studies focused on the Islamic world and the era of the Middle Ages and he was, in addition, an authority on Sanskrit and a curator of medieval manuscripts. He served as Dean of the University of Rome, where Schiaparelli would herself go on to study philosophy, his brother, astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli, had discovered the so-called canali, or Martian canals, the young Schiaparelli studied the heavens with her uncle.
A cousin of the brothers, Ernesto Schiaparelli, was a noted Egyptologist who discovered the tomb of Nefertari and was Director of the Museo Egizio in Turin. The cultural background and erudition of her family members served to ignite the imaginative faculties of Schiaparelli’s impressionable childhood years, she became enraptured with the lore of religious rites. These sources inspired her to pen a volume of poems titled Arethusa based on the ancient Greek myth of the hunt; the content of her writing so alarmed the conservative sensibilities of her parents they sought to tame her fantasy life by sending her to a convent boarding school in Switzerland. Once within the school’s confines, Schiaparelli rebelled against its strict authority by going on a hunger strike, leaving her parents to see no alternative but to bring her home again. Schiaparelli was dissatisfied by a lifestyle that whilst refined and comfortable, she considered cloistered and unfulfilling, her craving for adventure and exploration of the wider world led to her taking measures to remedy this, when a friend offered her a post caring for orphaned children in an English country house, she saw an opportunity to leave.
The placement however, proved uncongenial to Schiaparelli, who subsequently planned a return to the stop-over city of Paris rather than admit defeat by returning to Rome and her family. Schiaparelli fled to London to avoid the certainty of marriage to a persistent suitor, a wealthy Russian whom her parents favored and for whom she herself felt no attraction. In London, Schiaparelli who had held a fascination for psychic phenomena since childhood, attended a lecture on theosophy; the lecturer that night was Willem de Wendt, a man of various aliases, known as Willie Wendt and Wilhem de Kerlor. He was reported to have changed his name in England to Wilhelm Frederick Wendt de Kerlor, a combination of his father's last name and mother's maiden name. De Wendt's profession was one of a tireless, inventive self-promoter, in reality a con man who claimed to have psychic powers, numerous academic credentials, he alternatively and passed himself off as detective and criminal psychologist and lecturer. In a stint on the vaudeville stage de Kerlor billed himself as "The World Famous Dr. W. de Kerlor."
Schiaparelli was attracted to this charismatic charlatan and they became engaged on the next day of their first meeting. They married shortly thereafter in London on July 21, 1914, Schiaparelli was twenty-three, her new husband thirty. De Kerlor attempted to earn a living aggrandizing his reputation as a psychic practitioner as the couple subsisted on the wedding dowry and an allowance provided by Schiaparelli’s wealthy parents. Schiaparelli played the role of her husband's helpmate and helped facilitate the promotion of his fraudulent schemes. In 1915 the couple were forced to leave England after de Kerlor was deported following his conviction for practicing fortune-telling illegal, they subsequently lived a peripatetic existence in Paris, Cannes and Monte Carlo, before leaving for America in the spring of 1916. The de Kerlors disembarked in New York staying at the Brevoort, a prominent hotel in Greenwich Village relocated to an apartment above the Café des Artistes near Central Park West. De Kerlor rented offices to house his newly inaugurated "Bureau of Psychology" where he hoped to achieve fame and fortune through his paranormal and consulting work.
His wife acted as his assistant, providing clerical support for self-promotions crafted to provide the newspapers with sensational copy, win celebrity and garner acclaim. During this period de Kerlor came under the surveillance of the Federal government’s Bureau of Investigation, a precursor of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, not only for his dubious professional practices but on suspicion of harboring anti-British and pro-German allegiance during wartime. By 1917, de Kerlor’s acquaintance with journalists John Reed and Louise Bryant had positioned him on the government radar as a possible Bolshevik sympathizer and Communist revolutionary. Attempting to avoid this unremitting scrutiny, the de Kerlors decamped to Boston in 1918, where they continued their activities as they had done in New York. De Kerlor, an incurable publicity hound, made imprudent admissions to a BOI investigator in prideful support of the Russian Revolution and went so far as to admit to an association with a notorious anarchist, whilst his wife incriminated herself by revealing that she was tutoring Italians in Boston’s North End on the tenets
Balenciaga
Balenciaga is a luxury fashion house founded in Spain by Cristóbal Balenciaga, a designer born in the Basque Country, Spain. The brand is now owned by the French multinational company Kering. Balenciaga had a reputation as a couturier of uncompromising standards and was referred to as "the master of us all" by Christian Dior, his bubble skirts and odd, yet "modernistic silhouettes" became the trademarks of the house. Cristóbal Balenciaga opened his first boutique in San Sebastián, Spain, in 1917, which expanded to include branches in Madrid and Barcelona; the Spanish royal family and the aristocracy wore his designs, but when the Spanish Civil War forced him to close his stores, Balenciaga moved to Paris. Balenciaga opened his Paris couture house on Avenue George V in August 1937, his first fashion show featured designs influenced by the Spanish Renaissance. Balenciaga's success in Paris was nearly immediate. In the period of two years, the French press lauded him as a revolutionary, his designs were sought-after.
Carmel Snow, the editor of Harper's Bazaar was an early champion of his designs. Customers risked their safety to travel to Europe during World War II to see Balenciaga's clothing. During this period, he was noted for his "square coat," with sleeves cut in a single piece with the yoke, for his designs with black lace over bright pink fabric. However, it was not until the post-war years that the full scale of the inventiveness of this original designer became evident, his lines became more linear and sleek, diverging from the hourglass shape popularized by Christian Dior's "New Look". The fluidity of his silhouettes enabled him to manipulate the relationship between his clothing and women's bodies. In 1951, he transformed the silhouette, broadening the shoulders and removing the waist. In 1955, he designed the tunic dress, which developed into the chemise dress of 1958. Other contributions in the postwar era included the spherical balloon jacket, the high-waisted baby doll dress, the cocoon coat, the balloon skirt, the sack dress.
In 1959, his work culminated in the Empire line, with high-waisted dresses and coats cut like kimonos. His manipulation of the waist, in particular, contributed to "what is considered to be his most important contribution to the world of fashion: a new silhouette for women."In the 1960s, Balenciaga was an innovator in his use of fabrics: he tended toward heavy fabrics, intricate embroidery, bold materials. His trademarks included "collars that stood away from the collarbone to give a swanlike appearance" and shortened "bracelet" sleeves, his spare, sculptural creations—including funnel-shape gowns of stiff duchess satin worn to acclaim by clients such as Pauline de Rothschild, Bunny Mellon, Marella Agnelli, Hope Portocarrero, Gloria Guinness, Mona von Bismarck—were considered masterworks of haute couture in the 1950s and 1960s. In 1960, he designed the wedding dress for Queen Fabiola of Belgium made of ivory duchess satin trimmed with white mink at the collar and the hips. Jackie Kennedy famously upset John F. Kennedy for buying Balenciaga's expensive creations while he was President because he feared that the American public might think the purchases too lavish.
Her haute couture bills were discreetly paid by her father-in-law, Joseph Kennedy. Several designers who worked for Balenciaga would go on to open their own successful couture houses, notably Oscar de la Renta, Andre Courreges, Emanuel Ungaro, but his most famous and noted protégé was Hubert de Givenchy, the lone designer to side with Balenciaga against the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture Parisienne and the press over the scheduling of his shows. In 1957, Balenciaga famously decided to show his collection to the fashion press the day before the clothing retail delivery date, not the standard four weeks before the retail delivery date the fashion industry followed at the time. By keeping the press unaware of the design of his garments until the day before they were shipped to stores, he hoped to curtail ongoing piracy and copying of his designs; the press resisted, finding it nearly impossible to get his work into their print deadlines, but Balenciaga and protégé Givenchy stood firm impacting their coverage and press of the era.
His supporters would argue that rival Christian Dior would gain acclaim from copying Balenciaga's silhouettes and cuts, claiming them as his own original work. In 1967, both designers reversed their decision and joined the traditional schedule. Balenciaga defiantly resisted the rules and bourgeoisie status of the Chambre syndicale de la haute couture parisienne, thus, was never a member. Although he is spoken of with immense reverence, Balenciaga couture was never haute couture. Cristóbal Balenciaga closed his fashion house in 1968 and died in 1972; the house lay dormant until 1986. In 1986, Jacques Bogart S. A. acquired the rights to Balenciaga, opened a new ready-to-wear line, "Le Dix". The first collection was designed by Michel Goma in October 1987, who remained at the house for the next five years to mixed reviews, he was replaced in 1992 with Dutch designer Josephus Thimister who began the restoration of Balenciaga to high-fashion status. During Thimister's term, Nicolas Ghesquière would join as a license designer, was promoted to head designer in 1997.
In 1992, for the Summer Olympic Games, House of Balenciaga designed the French team's clothes. Balenciaga is now owned by Kering known as PPR, its womenswear and menswear was headed by Nicolas Ghesquière. Ghesquière, like Balenciaga, is a self-taught designer, appren
Carl Van Vechten
Carl Van Vechten was an American writer and artistic photographer, a patron of the Harlem Renaissance and the literary executor of Gertrude Stein. He gained fame as a writer, notoriety as well, for his novel Nigger Heaven. In his years, he took up photography and took many portraits of notable people. Although he was married to women for most of his adult life, Van Vechten engaged in numerous homosexual affairs over his lifetime. Born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, he was the youngest child of Ada Van Vechten. Both of his parents were well educated, his father was a prominent banker. His mother had great musical talent; as a child, Van Vechten developed a passion for theatre. He graduated from Washington High School in 1898. After high school, Van Vechten was eager to take the next steps in his life, but found it difficult to pursue his passions in Iowa, he described his hometown as "that unloved town". In order to advance his education, he decided in 1899 to study at the University of Chicago where he studied a variety of topics including music and opera.
As a student, he became interested in writing and wrote for the college newspaper, the University of Chicago Weekly. After graduating from college in 1903, Van Vechten accepted a job as a columnist for the Chicago American. In his column "The Chaperone", Van Vechten covered many different topics through a style of semi-autobiographical gossip and criticism. During his time with the Chicago American, he was asked to include photographs with his column; this was the first time he was thought to have experimented with photography which became one of his greatest passions. Van Vechten was fired from his position with the Chicago American because of what was described as an elaborate and complicated style of writing; some described his contributions to the paper as "lowering the tone of the Hearst papers". In 1906, he moved to New York City, he was hired as the assistant music critic at The New York Times. His interest in opera had him take a leave of absence from the paper in 1907 to travel to Europe and explore opera.
While in England, he married his long-time friend from Cedar Rapids. He returned to his job at The New York Times in 1909, where he became the first American critic of modern dance. Under the leadership of Van Vechten's social mentor Mabel Dodge Luhan, he became engrossed in avant-garde art; this was an innovative type of art which explores new styles or subject matters and is thought to be well ahead of other art in terms of technique, subject matter and application. He began to attend groundbreaking musical premieres at the time when Isadora Duncan, Anna Pavlova, Loie Fuller were performing in New York City, he attended premiers in Paris where he met American author and poet Gertrude Stein in 1913. He became a devoted champion of Stein, he was considered to be one of Steins most enthusiastic fans. They continued corresponding for the remainder of Stein's life, at her death, she appointed Van Vechten her literary executor. A collection of the letters between Van Vechten and Stein has been published.
Van Vechten wrote. In his piece, Van Vechten attempted to bring clarity to her works. Van Vechten came to the conclusion that Gertrude Stein is a difficult author to understand and she can be best understood when one has been guided through her work by an "expert insider", he writes that "special writers require special readers". The marriage to Anna Snyder ended in divorce in 1912, he wed actress Fania Marinoff in 1914. Van Vechten and Marinoff were known for ignoring the social separation of races during the times and for inviting blacks to their home for social gatherings, they were known to attend public gatherings for black people and to visit black friends in their homes. Although Van Vechten's marriage to his wife Fania Marinoff lasted for 50 years, they had arguments about Van Vechten's affairs with men. Van Vechten was known to have romantic and sexual relationships with men Mark Lutz. Mark Lutz was born in Richmond and was introduced to Van Vechten by Hunter Stagg in New York in 1931.
Lutz was a model for some of Van Vechten's earliest experiments with photography. The friendship lasted until Van Vechten's death. At Lutz's death, as per his wishes, the correspondence with Van Vechten, amounting to 10,000 letters, was destroyed. Lutz donated his collection of Van Vechten's photographs to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Several books of Van Vechten's essays on various subjects, such as music and literature, were published between 1915 and 1920, Vechten served as an informal scout for the newly formed Alfred A. Knopf. Between 1922 and 1930 Knopf published seven novels by him, starting with Peter Whiffle: His Life and Works and ending with Parties, his sexuality is most reflected in his intensely homoerotic portraits of working class men. As an appreciator of the arts, Van Vechten was intrigued by the explosion of creativity, occurring in Harlem, he was drawn towards its draw towards black writers and artists. He felt most accepted there as a gay man. Van Vechten promoted many of the major figures of the Harlem Renaissance, including Paul Robeson, Langston Hughes, Ethel Waters, Richard Wright, Zora Neale Hurston and Wallace Thurman.
Van Vechten's controversial novel Nigger Heaven was published in 1926. His essay "Negro Blues Singers" was published in Vanity Fair in 1926. Biographer Edward White suggests Van Vechten was convinced that
Clothing industry
Clothing industry or garment industry summarizes the types of trade and industry along the production and life chain of clothing and garments, starting with the textile industry via fashion industry to fashion retailers up to trade with second-hand clothes and textile recycling. The producing sectors build upon a wealth of clothing technology some of which, like the loom, the cotton gin, the sewing machine heralded industrialization not only of the previous textile manufacturing practices. By the early 20th century, the industry in the developed world involved immigrants in "sweat shops", which were legal but were sometimes illegally operated, they employed people in crowded conditions, working manual sewing machines, being paid less than a living wage. This trend worsened due to attempts to protect existing industries which were being challenged by developing countries in South East Asia, the Indian subcontinent and Central America. Although globalization saw the manufacturing outsourced to overseas labor markets, there has been a trend for the areas associated with the trade to shift focus to the more white collar associated industries of fashion design, fashion modeling and retail.
Areas involved in the "rag trade" include London and Milan in Europe, the SoHo district in New York City. There are considerable overlaps between the terms clothing - textile - and fashion industry; the clothing sector is concerned with all types of clothes, from fashion to uniforms, e-textiles and workwear. Textile industry is less concerned with the fashion aspect but produces the fabrics and fibres that are required for tailoring; the fashion industry follows - and sets - fashion trends to always supply the latest in non-functional clothing. The garment industry is a major contributor to the economies of many countries; the industry for Ready Made Garments has been criticized by labor advocates for the use of sweatshops, piece work and child labor. Working conditions in low-cost countries have received critical media coverage in the aftermath of large scale disasters like the 2013 Savar building collapse or the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. In 2016, the largest apparel exporting nations were China, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Indonesia.
By 2025, it is projected. It is projected that the e-commerce revenue will be worth 123 million in the United States by 2022. Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety Clothing line Fashion design services Fashion industry Fast fashion List of fabric names List of textile fibres Nylon riots Savile Row tailoring Shoemaking Sweatshop Tailor Textile Textile industry Fashion accessory Uniforms Carpenter, Jesse Thomas. Competition and Collective Bargaining in the Needle Trades, 1910-67 Chandler, Alfred The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business, pp 287, 289, 298, 308-09, 312 Cherington, Paul T; the Wool Industry: Commercial Problems of the American Woolen and Worsted Manufacture online Cole, Arthur H. "A neglected chapter in the history of combinations: The American wool manufacture." Quarterly Journal of Economics 37.3: 436-475. Copeland, Melvin Thomas; the cotton manufacturing industry of the United States online. Corbin, Harry A; the Men's Clothing Industry: Colonial Times Through Modern Times Fraser, Steve.
Labor will rule: Sidney Hillman and the rise of American labor head of Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. Godley, Andrew. Jewish immigrant entrepreneurship in New York and London 1880–1914.. Goldstein, Gabriel M. and Elizabeth Greenberg, eds. A Perfect Fit: The Garment Industry and American Jewry illustrated Green, Nancy L. Ready-to-wear and ready-to-work: a century of industry and immigrants in Paris and New York. Hapke, Laura. Sweatshop: the history of an American idea. Joselit, Jenna Weissman. A Perfect Fit: Clothes and the Promise of America Katz, Daniel. All together different: Yiddish socialists, garment workers, the labor roots of multiculturalism. Liebhold and Harry R. Rubenstein. Between a rock and a hard place: A history of American sweatshops, 1820-present. Nystrom, Paul; the Economics of Fashion Parmet, Robert D. The Master of Seventh Avenue The Master of Seventh Avenue David Dubinsky and the American Labor Movement, head of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union Pastorello, Karen.
A power among them: Bessie Abramowitz Hillman and the making of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. Pope, Eliphalet; the Clothing Industry in New York online Popkin, Martin E. Organization and Technology in the Manufacture of Men's Clothing Seidman, Joel; the Needle Trades Tyson, Thomas. "Collective bargaining and cost accounting: the case of the US men's clothing industry." Accounting and Business Research 25.97: 23-38
Mariano Fortuny (designer)
Mariano Fortuny y Madrazo was a Spanish fashion designer who opened his couture house in 1906 and continued until 1946. He was the son of the painter Mariano Fortuny y Marsal. Fortuny was born on 11 May 1871, to an artistic family in Spain, his father, a genre painter, died when Fortuny was three years old and his mother, daughter of another painter, Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta, moved the family to Paris, France. It was apparent at a young age that Fortuny was a giffted artist, showing a talent for painting as well as a passion for textiles. During his childhood he was introduced to many different textiles and fabrics, which imprinted upon his creativity, his parents were passionate for materials and had their own collections of textiles from various shops they had visited in Europe. His father collected metalwork and armour from previous ages as a hobby; as a young child he was fascinated with all of these textiles and would dye pieces of material for amusement. It was this exposure that led him to producing his own textiles and dresses.
The family moved again in 1889 to Italy. As a young man, Fortuny travelled throughout Europe seeking out artists he admired, among them the German composer Richard Wagner. Fortuny became quite varied in his talents, some of them including inventing, photography, architecture and theatrical stage lighting. In 1897, he met the woman he would marry, Henriette Negrin, in Paris. While in Paris Fortuny registered and patented more than 20 inventions between 1901 and 1934, he was buried in the Campo Verano in Rome. His work was a source of inspiration to the French novelist Marcel Proust; the life of the Fortuny saga has been depicted in Pere Gimferrer's novel "Fortuny". In 1892, after seeing some of Richard Wagner’s work in Paris, Fortuny traveled to Bayreuth, Germany where Wagner had built a theater designed to put on his operas, he was mesmerized by Wagner’s work and began to paint scenes for his operas when he returned to Venice. In Wagnerian drama, architecture, song and poetry all worked together towards a common goal.
This affected Fortuny’s outlook and was the inspiration for a brand new type of theater design where the designer and the technician would work together on a project from idea to realization. Fortuny and other followers of this concept believed that one can only improve the quality of a product by having a good knowledge of something’s raw materials and the process of its construction, he thought that the best type of design was created when the artist knew how to realize the design and controlled all of the steps in the creative process. Through his experiences with Wagner and the theatre, Fortuny became a lighting engineer, inventor and set designer; as a set designer, he wanted to create a more seamless way of transitioning from one scene to another other than flying out a backdrop and bringing in a new one. He began experimenting with light and different ways to do this in the attic of his palazzo in Italy. With his experimentation, he found that reflecting light off of different surfaces could change the color and other properties of light.
His 1904 treatise Eclairage Scenique describes the discovery that formed the basis of his indirect lighting technique. He concluded that, "... it is not the quantity but the quality of light that makes things visible and allows the pupil... to open properly."He used these indirect lighting techniques in his new invention, the Fortuny cyclorama dome, a quarter dome shaped structure of plaster or cloth. Fortuny first filed a patent for his indirect theatrical lighting system in 1901 and refined his invention thereafter; the shape created the look of a more extensive sky and Fortuny could create any type of sky he wanted by reflecting light onto it in a certain way. He could reflect clouds on the backdrop by painting different things on the mirrors that reflected light onto the dome. During the 1920s Fortuny’s contribution to the theatre gained widespread recognition. After studying and perfecting his dome, its use was becoming more popular in many theatres in Europe, he was soon contracted to install his dome in La Scala of Milan.
However, for this project he was required to make some adaptations for the dome to be used at its maximum potential. The theatre was much larger than his original dome so he increased the size so that he could allow the dome to fill the space of the stage completely, he made it so that the dome was "electrically controlled and could fold and unfold like a giant accordion in the space of 90 seconds. More impressively, he invented a suction fan for this project, which forced out the air so as to keep the structure taut. From the audience’s point of view this helped the backdrop’s depth to seem infinite as if you were looking at a night sky that never ended. After all the adaptations were made and the construction was completed, the dome opened on 7 January 1922, with a production of Parsifal. From the same concept of the dome, Fortuny created a lamp that could be used to recreate indoor lighting onstage, the Fortuny Moda Lamp. Although intended for use as a stage lamp and patented in 1903, this lighting fixture remains popular as a floor lamp.
The achievements that Fortuny is most well known for were made in the field of fashion design. His wife Henriette Negrin was an experienced dressmaker. From 1902 they lived in the Palazzo Pesaro Orfei in Venice,:49 which Fortuny filled with the artwork of his father, art that his father collected, and
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