Vintage Miscellany – March 13, 2016

It’s the 1940s.  If not for the big, happy smile on her face, you might suppose these women are running to escape some unknown menace.  Or maybe the water was colder than it looked and one big wave sent them scurrying for the comfort of a chenille beach cape.  Photos should come with a backstory!

And now for the news…

• Many of our castoff clothes end up with textile recyclers in India.  This short film tells the recycling story through the words of the people who work in this industry.  Some of what they have to say is simply amazing.
• This interesting collecting story is not about clothing, but the ethical side of things is quite interesting.
• 200 Years of Australian Fashion exhibition will bring together more than 120 works by over 90 Australian designers.  Currently showing at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, one of the standout pieces is an early 1960s dress with a skirt made of vivid blue ostrich feathers.  Here’s a bit about the restoration of the dress.
• And the tales of fashion copying just keep on coming.
• It’s not just clothing, as Ralph Lauren has found out.  It’s not nice to copy a teddy bear, either.
• My new favorite time-waster past-time is the Cooper Hewitt online collection.  It is one of the most user-friendly collection databases I know of, with multiple ways to search.  I’m working my way through the 25,629 items pictured from the department of textiles. There is a shoebox feature that lets you save the items you want to revisit in your own little collection.
• FIT Special Collections has announced the availability to researchers of the papers of Eleanor Lambert.   From the FIT blog: “As a whole, the collection—which is made up of press materials, correspondence, records, fashion ephemera and photographs—tells the incredible story of the rise of American fashion beginning in the 1940s and its evolution into the global powerhouse that it is today. Lambert, who has been called ‘The Empress of 7th Avenue,’ succeeded in putting American fashion on the map.”
• One of the buzziest ideas in fashion today is genderless fashion.  Here is how gender neutrality looked 100 years ago.
• The Museum at FIT has a fantastic online exhibition to go with their currently show, The Women of Harper’s Bazaar, 1936-1958.
• Mark My Words: The Subversive History of Women Using Thread as Ink
• Finally, a big congratulations to Kenn and Jonathan of the Fashion History Museum, on the official opening in Cambridge, Ontario.