Fashion icon, Diana Vreeland enriched the world with her brilliant imagination accompanied by her glamorous presence. Diana Vreeland by Eleanor Dwight reveals how the cosmopolitan heir became the 20th century’s most influential fashion editor through determination and creative talent. Vreeland’s biography encapsulates her “pizzazz” as it chronicles her personal history and professional progress.
Taken from Vreeland’s personal scrapbooks, this lavish book displays more than three hundred never-before-seen color and black-and-white photographs and illustrations by top fashion photographers of the period, including David Bailey, Cecil Beaton, Brassaü, Louise Dahl-Wolfe, and Irving Penn. The pictures feature designers, models, and celebrities inspired by Vreeland, such as Cecil Beaton, Marisa Berenson, Truman Capote, Carmen, Coco Chanel, Christian Dior, Hubert de Givenchy, Lauren Hutton, Jackie Kennedy, Yves Saint Laurent, Oscar de la Renta, Elsa Schiaparelli, Andy Warhol, and Elsie de Wolfe.
The beginning of the book introduces Diana Dalziel, a privileged yet insecure debutante growing up in New York City during the Gilded Age. Young Diana, dissatisfied with her homely appearance, set out on a mission to reinvent herself. She changed her style and mannerisms. She developed grace, wit and poise. “Too bad your sister is so beautiful and you’re so extremely ugly,” her mother told her. Despite the emotional abuse inflicted by from her narcissistic mother, she remained optimistic and eventually achieved her goal of gaining popularity with her peers. Like her socialite mother, she became a regular in the society pages.
Although Diana Vreeland never attained a college education, in 1937, Harper’s Bazaar hired her as fashion editor, writ...
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...mportant subject to learn about because she changed fashion forever. Ironically, this awkward and eccentric girl grew up to become the 20th century’s authority on style. During the 1940s to the 1970s, she maintained a profound influence in the fashion world, dictating fashion and style trends.
“You are and always will be my fashion mentor,” Jackie Kennedy wrote to Vreeland, who assisted the First Lady in designing her signature style that women all over America imitated in the 1960s. Her clever advice enthused Harper’s Bazaar readers from the 1930s to the 1960s, and she ran Vogue in its most groundbreaking years from 1963 to1972. Finally, she managed the wildly successful annual historical costume shows at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute for 13 years.
Although demanding and flamboyant, she had impeccable taste. When she died, she became a legend.
These beautiful clothes dazzled the nation. Jackie inspired a whole new look and had a big influence on the current styles.
Jacqueline Kennedy's fashion influence the news story as often as public addresses of the President. “All the talk over what I wear and how I fix my hair has amused me and puzzled me. What does my hairdo have to do with my husband's ability to be President?" (Perry 60). Jacqueline Kennedy’s question was one that needed addressing because for a little over a century American First Ladies’ fashions were constantly being critiqued on a celebrity-like status. First Lady Mary Lincoln also worried about her appearance was recorded telling her seamstress that she felt the public was her greatest critic (Weinham 1). Jacqueline Kennedy’s question proved that the conundrum persisted through to the twentieth century. With Mrs. Kennedy’s logic, political actions on the president’s behalf should have been the only concern the American public had with their First Lady,but the role of First Lady held unwritten conditions. An astounding $300,000,000 was given by the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union to John Kennedy’s presidential campaign to ensure that Jacqueline Kennedy would “buy American” (Perry 58). Even though this is rare case of her fashion’s effect on JFK’s presidential campaigning, her choice in shoes was a miniscule factor to the grand scheme of his election into office.Unbeknownst to Jacqueline Kennedy before her husband’s office, her appearance would have little to do with her “husband’s ability to be president,” but rather, her own ability to embody the ever-evolving American Woman as First Lady of the United States.Jacqueline Kennedy's striking fashion reflected the Women's Liberation Movement with demanding colors, attention, and respect, structured suits and blueprints, and adaptable colloquial outfits a...
Berry, Hannah. “The Fashion Industry: Free to Be an Individual.” The Norton Field Guide to
In the story of “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker there is a character named Dee Johnson and she is a very clever person. Alice Walker makes Dee Johnson’s character into a very clever but shallow. In the first paragraph, Walker makes Dee’s image, who first seems shallow but as the story goes on she becomes clever. Dee then changes to a more difficult character as the story proceeds. Dee was blessed with both beauty and brains but as the story proceeds it tells that she still struggles with both her heritage and identity. While growing up she is very ashamed of her heritage and where she comes from. She is very fortunate to be the first in her family to go to college. As she starts becoming educated she starts feeling superior over her family.
As a teenager, Marie spent her time enjoying Versailles' and Paris' night life with a notorious clique and fondness of making fashion statements through extravagant couture and bold coiffures (“The Grand Dauphin”). ...
Miss Hancock, her personality and beliefs were contrasted entirely by her character foil, Charlotte’s mother, “this civilized, this clean, this disciplined woman.” All through Charlotte’s life, her mother dictated her every move. A “small child [was] a terrible test to that cool and orderly spirit.” Her mother was “lovely to look at, with her dark-blond hair, her flawless figure, her smooth hands. She never acted frazzled or rushed or angry, and her forehead was unmarked by age lines or worry. Even her appearance differed greatly to Miss Hancock, who she described as,” overdone, too much enthusiasm. Flamboyant. Orange hair.” The discrepancy between the characters couldn’t escape Charlotte’s writing, her metaphors. Her seemingly perfect mother was “a flawless, modern building, created of glass and the smoothest of pale concrete. Inside are business offices furnished with beige carpets and gleaming chromium. In every room there are machines – computers, typewriters, intricate copiers. They are buzzing and clicking way, absorbing and spitting out information with the speed of sound. Downstairs, at ground level, people walk in and out, tracking mud and dirt over the steel-grey tiles, marring the cool perfection of the building. There are no comfortable chairs in the lobby.” By description, her mother is fully based on ideals and manners, aloof, running her life with “sure and perfect control.” Miss
Who sets the standards for beauty? What must one do to truly look beautiful? What does feeling beautiful mean? When considering the concept of beauty one must differentiate between the universal and relative perception of beauty. Among the components of universal beauty are harmony, symmetry and utility. However, perception of beauty is also relative, when it is defined by the standards of the time that are subjective to the socio economic values of the era. One of the ways these values are communicated is through images portrayed in art and in modern times through the media. ‘Fashion’ is the carrier of theses values though physical appearance and self-image that define power, rank, acceptability and belonging. Having ‘fashion’ as the medium of these relative values bring advantages and disadvantages. Although there are benefits of matching the fashion of the time, positive self-image and satisfaction with a feeling of acceptance these are temporary because fashion is ever changing. On the other hand not conforming to the contemporary standards can have a detrimental impact on self-image that leads to feeling a sense negative self worth and marginalized. Eating disorders are a powerful manifestation that fashion has on the psyche. The underlying idea of what fashion ‘is’ is value. Amongst all the change of fashion, value remains ever present.
Werle, Simone. Fashionista A Century of Style Icons. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1977. Print.
Veness, Alison, 21 May 1994, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis: The first lady of fashion set her own style: Although betrayed by her marriage to Onassis, the public was unable to end its love affair with America's undisputed queen of fashion - She was modern, ice-cool and always elegant, recalls Alison Veness Fashion Correspondent
She lives in an imaginary world in her head where her actual life does not match the ideal life she is living. She believes her beauty and charm make her worthy of greater things. She wears knock-off jewelry, clothes, and goes to high end parties, but dresses and acts like she is wealthy. The bliss of her evening at these parties were not achieved by angst, and the reality of her appearance is much different than it seems. The party is a conquest because for the first time, her appearance matches the reality of her life. Her wealth and class are simply illusions, and other people are easily deceived. I liked this short story because it relates to people today being concerned with their appearance and social class instead of their character and being blessed with what they have. I live by a certain quote every day by John Wooden he once said, “ Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while you reputation is merely what others think you
Working at her father’s clothing shop, she became very knowledgeable about expensive textiles and embellishments, which were captured in her works later in career. She was able to capture the beauty and lavishness of fabrics in portraits of aristocratic women.
From a young age, Richard Avedon was exposed to fashion. But little did the small boy sitting in his father’s 5th Avenue womens’ clothing store know, that he would later become the worlds’ biggest fashion photographer. He was born in New York City in 1923 to Jacob Avedon a Russian immigrant who worked his way up in the city to finally own his own clothing store. Avedon’s mother, Anna, was a musical and artsy woman who was his artistic muse. His sister, Louise, was also an inspiration to him. As a child, he constantly took pictures of his beautiful sister, his first model. His interest in photography began after joining a photography club at his local Young Men's Hebrew Association. After graduating high school in 1941, Richard attended Columbia University to study philosophy and poetry, but after just one year, he dropped out to enlist in the military marines. In the marines,he was a photographer in World War Two, taking pictures for identification cards.
Freeman S. (2004). In Style: Femininity and Fashion since the Victorian Era. Journal of Women's History; 16(4): 191–206
Fashion has been around ever since ancient times, since the time of the Romans, it survived the world wars and is yet today a business with rapid changes. Fashion started off as an art form, a way for the rich to show their social status with unique and innovative designs that only they could afford. It was a way to separate the social classes of the society. In this paper I will include the creators of haute couture, and how the following designers developed couture, as well as leading names in today’s ready-to-wear industry. The list is long, but I chose to focus on the three most important designers in the modern fashion industry.
...r became more creative person in the fashion shoot, after the designer. The overall photograph would sell your garment to the best ability that the photographer could achieve. It was not just about being a beautiful model in the photograph, there had to be other ways of making the photograph appealing than the simple lacklustre way of being beautiful. Although, every woman wants to be beautiful, the photographer wanted to challenge the appearance of beauty. And also challenge the way we looked at people that were not beautiful, but had a unique quality to them. The fashion photographer had a lot of power in Fashion; they could make a normal street person become the key icon for desire and envy. The photograph had the power to sell the clothes using anyone the photographer pleased, and the designer didn’t mind as long as their clothes were being recognized, and sold.