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The working life of a women in retail in the 1930s was tough, but not beyond the no-nonsense Ethyle Campbell. Quite unlike any other book about the rag trade in the ʼ30s, this semi-autobiographical account of Campbell's time as a fashion buyer for a London department store rings with her slangy informative banter as she plies her trade, often hilariously, between the shop floor, the couture houses of Paris and factories of New York. The realities...
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Vogue was a newly formed weekly society magazine when Edna Woolman Chase arrived on its staff in 1895 at the young age of 18. Alongside its second owner, Condé Nast, she went on to remodel it into the institution we know today. Just a few days before he died, Condé wrote to Edna to express his deepest gratitude for her role in the creation of Vogue: "… without you I could never have built Vogue. We have built this great property together."
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First published a year after World War II ended, this fictional text was written for a generation of women starved by war rationing of both clothing and makeup. Speculation on the true identity of the author takes in Norman Hartnell and Edward Molyneaux. Written in the format of a fashion show, the fantastical narrative describes a stream of mannequins as they step onto the catwalk, each bedecked in robes made from yards of silk, velvet and brocade,...
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Sir Norman Hartnell (1901–1979) dominated London couture during the inter-war years, gaining international fame as dressmaker to the British royal family. Silver and Gold, first published in 1955, tells how he formed his couture house, his appointment as dressmaker to the royal family in 1935, and the most momentous commissions of his career: Princess Elizabeth's wedding gown in 1947, and her magnificent Coronation dress six years later. Best known...
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Aage Thaarup left his job in a Copenhagen department store in his teens to conquer the world. By the late 1930s, he had a shop in London and was milliner to the royal family. Revealed to the world by Cecil Beaton, his famous customers included Wallis Simpson, Margot Fonteyn and Marlene Dietrich – but the pinnacle of his career came with the creation of the tricorn hat worn by the Queen annually between 1953 and 1986 at the Trooping the Colour ceremony....
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Derided by the traditional fashion establishment for declaring Mick Jagger 'stylish', Janey Ironside's career in the fashion industry was inseparable from her identity. As Professor of Fashion Design at the Royal College of Art from 1956 to 1968 she played a role in the sixties revolution that turned Britain's rag trade into a high-turnover mass-market industry targeting a new generation of cash-rich youth. Working behind the scenes, she trained a...
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Icon of the sixties and one of the first supermodels, Jean Shrimpton rose to fame alongside photographer David Bailey. Together they revolutionized fashion photography with a new gritty street style. Perceptive, personal and disarming, The Truth About Modelling covers the early years of Shrimpton's life and career including her transformation at Lucie Clayton's modelling school from a naive country-loving teenager into a Vogue and Harper's Bazaar...
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Readers of The Sunday Times knew that the fashion journalist Ernestine Carter could spot a winner from a mile away, whether at a Paris couturier or a boutique on London's King's Road. Apocryphally, whatever she praised on Sunday was sold out by Monday lunchtime.
In her entertaining and informative autobiography, Carter recalls her illustrious career as Fashion Editor at Harper's Bazaar during the 50s, describing her attendance at haute couture shows...
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Pierre Balmain ranks with the greatest couturiers of the mid-twentieth century. He created dresses for royalty, stage and screen stars with customers including Marlene Dietrich, Katherine Hepburn, Sophia Loren, Gertrude Stein and the Duchess of Windsor. More recently, his vintage gowns have been worn by Penelope Cruz and Angelina Jolie.
During his early career Balmain worked alongside Christian Dior for the couturier Lucien Lelong. The two became...
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