The year prior to his death, the legendary fashion designer, Charles James donated a small selection of correspondence, business records, press clippings and four original sketches to FIT Library’s Special Collections. Over the course of several months, many letters […]
Year: 2014
Showgirls, starlets and ingenues in training: Costume Patterns of the 1930s
In the spirit of Halloween, we’ve been sharing some of our favorite costume designs from the collection on our new Instagram feed all week (@fitspecialcollections). We found one of these costume holdings especially fun and wanted to share a little more […]
Perfume+Publicity+Poiret
We were recently gifted two very special objects: two paper publicity fans for the French perfume company, Rosine. Established in 1911, by the avant-garde couturier Paul Poiret following a trip to Vienna where he visited the Weiner Werkstatte, Rosine was part of Poiret’s greater vision […]
Pochibukuro Please!
These tiny Japanese envelopes measuring a mere 3 1/2 x 1 1/2″ are called pochibukuro and were created to conceal money traditionally given as tips for services rendered. In the Kyoto dialect the word pochi means ‘a little bit’ so the sums of money […]
Embroidery for Me!
A curious little catalog came to our attention recently after it was determined that it was in need of some minor conservation. Titled in French, published in Switzerland, written in English and priced in English £s, Broderies Universelles, is a mail […]
Sports et divertissements
During the 1910s and 1920s, Paris was a hotbed of artistic experimentation. The hierarchy of artistic mediums seemed to dissolve away as painters collaborated with dancers, fashion designers with decorative artists, and—in the case of Sports et divertissements— illustrators with musicians. […]
Havana Nights: Eric de Juan designs for Josephine Baker
I’m sure that most of you have heard by now about the extensive renovation of The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute, which has been recently renamed the Anna Wintour Costume Center. The $40 million renovation encompassed not only the public gallery spaces, […]