Charles James

A sneak peek into Charles James: Beyond Fashion at the Met

I popped uptown yesterday to the Metropolitan Museum Costume Institute’s new Anna Wintour Costume Center for the press preview of its first exhibition, Charles James: Beyond Fashion spotlighting the career of  the legendary 20th-century Anglo-American couturier  (1906–1978). Through the years, I've seen pieces of James work  and many of the gowns on display seemed like beautiful old friends that I was delighted to reaquaint with. But it wasn't a gown that made me smile. The first down jacket, and it was couture. It was seeing his white celenese satin jacket with eiderdown filling, 1937, a textile based sculpture in response to the boxy fur jackets that designer Elsa Schiaparelli was showing and what many women wore at the time. Love it or leave it, this

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American Fashion On View

Charles James "Butterfly" Dress, 1955. Smoke gray silk chiffon; pale gray silk satin; aubergine, lavender, and oyster white tulle. Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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Clothing Construction, the Beauty Behind the Seams

American Beauty, Aesthetics and Innovation in Fashion on exhibition It's so easy to get the look, but what is the mastery behind its seams? “Knowing the sewing construction is what makes one a designer not a stylist,” Charles Kleibacker, at the FIT American Style Symposium. There's no doubt that I'm a seam queen! I can spot a well-made garment in an instant and appreciate the craft that went into its construction. It comes from a discerning eye and knowing when it matters most to have the best that you can or when a trendier throwaway version is just fine. Or, perhaps, the contemporary combination of the mixing both high and low fashion. Maria Cornejo dress In the modern world of

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