Woman's Dress

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Woman's Dress

United States, California, circa 1953
Costumes; principal attire (entire body)
Wool knit
Center back length: 35 3/4 in. (90.81 cm)
Gift of the Fashion Group, Inc. (M.73.102.6)
Costume and Textiles
Not currently on public view

Curator Notes

As a boy in Vienna, Gernreich spent countless hours sketching high fashion in his aunt’s dress shop....
As a boy in Vienna, Gernreich spent countless hours sketching high fashion in his aunt’s dress shop. In California, following a career in dance, he based his fashion designs on the beauty of the natural body in motion. Renouncing garment construction methods of the 1950s that sculpted the female body into an idealized hourglass silhouette, Gernreich created this knitted dress, utilizing the inherent elasticity of the material to mold the body without boning, padding, cutting, or further tailoring.

(California Design, 1930–1965: "Living in a Modern Way," 2011-12)
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Bibliography

  • Kaplan, Wendy, ed. California Design, 1930-1965: Living in a Modern Way. Los Angeles: Los  Angeles County Museum of Art; Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2011.
  • Kaplan, Wendy, ed. Living in a Modern Way: California Design, 1930-1965.  Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2013. 

Exhibition history

  • California Design, 1930–1965: "Living in a Modern Way" Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, October 1, 2011 - June 3, 2012