Omg!!! Thank God It Is Friday!!!! ( Late Post)

                                                    Happy Friday!!!

 What a long work week!!! Thank God we survived!!!! 😂😎

Today Black History Lesson is about Patrick Kelly (September 24, 1954-January 1, 1990).

Born in Vicksburg Mississippi, Kelly attended Jackson Sate University where he studied art but later on he decided to attend Parsons School of Design. At the age of 18 he moved to Atlanta and he sold reworked, recycled clothes and he also served as an unpaid widow window dress for the famous Yves Saint Laurent. In the year 1988 the YSL chairman Pierre Berge sponsored Kelly to form the womenswear fashion house which was called Patrick Kelly Paris. 

While working from Paris Kelly produced many collections for five years. He received some financial backing from the US based fashion conglomerate Warnaco in July 1987 with that help he was able to hire a staff and eventually achieve a profit of 7.2 million per year. In 1988 he achieved his greatest accomplishment ever he became the first American and the first person of color to be admitted as a member of the Chambre syndicale. 

This accomplishment allowed his designs to be sold in upscale retailers which included Henri Bendel, Bergdorf Goodman and Bloomingdales. His designs were also worn by celebrities that included Isabella Rossellini, Bette Davis, Cicely Tyson and the famous Grace Jones. His designs stood out because he used many bright colors, he used ribbons and buttons that sometimes suggested a sense of whimsy and joy while most of the times it was addressing difficult issues of race. Majority of the time this was pointed out because Kelly would give his audience a tiny brown doll with molded black hair that could be described as " pickaninny". 

Kelly died at the age 35 on New Year's Day. His cause of death was reported as an bone marrow disease and a brain tumor but the actual cause of death was complications of AIDS. He will be remembered for being an extremely hard worker that gained his reputation for demanding his staff to match his work ethic. He also was a strong advocate for models of color he made it his duty to include them in his work. 

Happy Friday Eve!!!

                        Happy Friday Eve!! 😎

Today I would like to share with you the brilliant, talent and creative Art Smith ( 1917-1982).

Art Smith was born to Jamaica parents in Cuba in the year 1917.  His family moved to Brooklyn, NY in 1920 and Smith was able to show off his talents. When he was in the eighth grade he entered in a poster contest that was held by the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty of Animals he won honorable mention in the contest. With this accomplishment at such a young age when he became older he was encouraged to apply to Fashion school. 

He received a scholarship to Copper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. While attending the university his advisors tried their best to steer him towards architecture because they felt that he will find a job in the civil sector. He struggled with Math so that forced him to turned to commercial art and a major in sculpture. Smith graduated in the year 1940. 

He worked for the National Youth Administration and also the Junior Administration after graduation. These two organizations helped young teenagers find employment. During his down time, he took a course in jewelry making at New York University. 

While attending the night school he gained a mentor by the name Winifred Mason. She had a small jewelry store/ studio in Greenwich Village this is where Smith became her full time assistant. 

In the year 1946 he opened his own studio/ shop on Cornelia Street in the village. Where his shop was located it was known as the " Italian block" and he suffered racial violence form majority of his neighbors. It got to the point where his windows were smashed and he felt unwanted. 

Smith eventually moved to 140 W Fourth Street which was just 1/2 block from Washington Square park which is known as the heart of Greenwich Village. This particular area is where openly gay black artist felt at home. With his store being such a success it brought him a lot of business deals to the point where he he started to sell his wares to craft stores in Boston, San Francisco and Chicago. 

By the mid-1950s he had so many business opportunities that he was getting offers from Bloomingdale and Milton Heffing which is two big department stores in Manhattan. He also developed relationship with James Boutique in Houston, L ‘Unique in Minneapolis and Black Tulip in Dallas. 

In the same year he received feature coverage in both Vogue and Harper's Bazaar and he was also mentioned in The New York Shopper guide "On the Avenue." By the year 1960's he started to use silver more in his jewelry and his client base increased. He also suffered a heart attack in the same year.  His health started to decline in the year 1970 by then the shop on West Fourth closed. Smith died in the year 1982. 

Fun Fact: He designed a brooch for Eleanor Roosevelt and he also made cufflinks for Duke Ellington. 

 

Trivia Tuesday: Jay Jaxon

This week in Sports has been a good one. Wizards vs Cavs game was beyond amazing. I am not sure how Lebron was able to pull off that shot that he made but he did...  Congrats to the Cavs on their win... Congrats to the Wizards for doing an amazing job as well.

Today black history lesson is about Fashion and Costume Designer Jay Jaxon( 1941-2006). 

Born in Queens, NY, Jay Jaxon was " an accidental fashion designer" he was introduced to fashion by his seamstress girlfriend.  His rise in the fashion industry began at the age 24. He was able to start training in Paris at the house of Yves St. Laurent, Christian Dior and Jean Louis Scherrer to help with the failing line. 

With this accomplishment he became the first black couturier in Paris and also the first American. 

 French and American press emphasize his race over his nationally and it would often frustrated Jaxon. He often had to remind himself that his work was the coming together of all people.  

In the year 1970 he became  one of the leading 7th Avenue Designers of haute couture in New York City during that time. He continued most of his designing and work during the latter part of his career for numerous television productions like "Motown 25, " Ally McBeal, " The Division" and "American Dreams". 

He also worked on the famous movie " Mr & Mrs. Smith". 

His pieces are sold in high end luxury department stores named Bendel's and Bonwit Teller. 

With his well known recognition he became a personal designer and fashion consultant to many well known celebrities. 

In July 19, 2006 he died from complications from prostate cancer. He was remembered in the New York Times.  

Monday Blues: Mildred Blount

Happy Monday!!!
Congrats to the Superbowl Champs New England Patriots!!! The game was beyond amazing....

Today I wanted to start the week off with the wonderful Mildred Blount ( 1907-1974).

Mildred Blount was an widely recognized leading milliner in the 1930's and 1940's. Her interest in millinery slowly left her once she started working at Madame Clair's Dress and Hat Shop in New York City. Her and her sister, who was a dressmaker opened their own dress and hat shop which aimed towards serving the wealthy New Yorkers.

By the year 1939 her designs were shown at the New York World Fair and by then her career took off. She was asked to design hats for the films Gone with the Wind and Easter Parade as well as for the cover of the August 1942 issue of the Ladies Home Journal.

Later in the year 1940 she ran an hat shop in Beverly Hills. She had A-list clients like Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell, Gloria Vanderbilt, Marian Anderson and many others. Among all of her accomplishments she was the first African American member of the Motion Pictures Costumers Union which allowed her to work in film studios.

In the year 1974 she passed away in Los Angeles, California.

Happy Friday!!! - Meet Zelda Wynn Valdes

                         HAPPY FRIDAY !!!!

Apparently President Donald Trump  renamed " Black History Month to " African American History Month" ....... Why fix something that doesn't need fixing........ Let's fix the real issues...


Today lesson is about Zelda Wynn Valdes- ( June 28, 1905- September 26,2001).

Growing up in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania Zelda began her professional career working in her uncle's White Plains, New York tailoring shop. During that time she began working as a stock girl at a high-end boutique and eventually she worked her self up to selling and making alternations with these accomplishments she became the shop's first black sales clerk and tailor.

With all the knowledge that she learned while working at her uncle's boutique she was able to open Chez Zelda which was her own  boutique in Manhattan on Broadway and West 158th St in 1948.

Within that year she dressed the entire bridal party for Marie Ellington and Nat King Cole.

By the year 1950 she moved " Chez Zelda" to 57th st in midtown.

She became the designer of the original Playboy Bunny Costume although it is still not clear if she was the sole creator of the costume. She also was one of the founders of the National Association of Fashion Accessory Designers which is an industry group that intend to promote black design professionals.

In the year 1970, Arthur Mitchell asked her to design costumes for his new company known as the Dance Theater of Harlem.  With that recognition under her belt she designed for eighty-two productions in the year 1992.  She eventually closed her boutique in 1989 but she continued to work with the Dance Theater of Harlem until she passed in 2001 at the age 96.

Fashion Designer: Ann Cole Lowe

Congrats to Queen Bee once again for breaking the internet yesterday with her wonderful news of expecting twins with Husband Jay Z what a great way to start off Black History Month...

Today for our black history lesson I would like to share with you.....
Fashion Designer Ann Cole Lowe. (1898-1981)

Ann Cole Lowe was born in Clayton, Alabama, the great grandmother of a slave woman and an Alabama plantation owner. She had an older sister named Sallie. Lowe's interest in fashion came from her mother and grandmother, both of them worked as seamstress for the first families of Montgomery and other members of high society. When Lowe's was 16 her mother passed and at the time of her death she was in the process of working on four ball gowns for the First Lady of Alabama, Elizabeth Kirkman O'Neal. With the skills that Lowe learned from her mother and grandmother she finished the dresses.

By the year 1912, Lowe married Lee Cohen and they had a son together. After her marriage her husband wanted her to give up working as a seamstress. She complied for some time and eventually she left him after she was hired to design a wedding dress for a woman in Florida.

Lowe and her son moved to New York in the year 1917 and she enrolled in S.T. Taylor Design School. Since the school was segregated Lowe was required to attend class in a room alone.

She graduated in 1919. After Lowe graduated she moved to Tampa, Florida. The following year she opened her first dress salon " Annie Cohen". Her salon catered to members of high society only. The salon was such an success that Lowe was able to save $20,000 from her earnings and she returned back to New York in 1928. While living in New York she worked for commission for stores such as Henri Bendel, Chez Sonia, Neiman Marcus, and Saks Fifth Avenue.

In 1946 she designed the dress that Olivia De Havilland wore to accept the Academy Award for Best Actress for To Each His Own, although the name on the dress was Sonia Rosenberg. Since she noticed that she wasn't getting credit for her work she decided to open a second salon, Ann Lowe's Gowns in New York on Lexington Ave in 1950. Her one of a kind designs made from the finest fabrics were an success and she attracted many wealthy, high society clients.

Throughout her career she was known for being very selective about her clientele. She used to describe herself as " an awful snob".  This quote below would show why she felt that way about herself.

" I love my clothes and I'm particular about who wears them. I am not interested in sewing for cafe society or social climbers. I do not cater to Mary and Sue. I sew for families of the Social Register"

With her high clientele she was hired in 1953 to design a wedding dress for future First Lady Jacqueline Bouvier and the dresses for her bridal attendants for her September wedding to Senator John F. Kennedy. Lowe was chosen by the bride's mother Janet Auchincloss who had previously commissioned Lowe to design the wedding dress she wore when she married Hugh D. Auchincloss in 1942.

The dress she designed was amazing it consisted of fifty yards of "ivory silk taffeta with interwoven bands of tucking forming the bodice and similar tucking in large circular designs swept around the full skirt. The price of the dress was $500 back then but in today's time it is approximately $4,000. Even tho the wedding was a highly publicized event, Lowe did not receive public credit for her
work.

Eventually Lowe continued to work for wealthy clients who often talked her out of charging hundreds of dollars for her designs, After making sure her staff was paid she often didn't make that much of a profit from her designs she was basically broke. In 1962 she lost her salon in New York due to not paying taxes and within that same year she experienced major health issues.

Once her health was taking care off she opened another store in 1968, Ann Lowe Originals on Madison Avenue. After this store opening she retired in 1972. After an extended illness she past away on February 25,1981.

Her legacy lives on throughout many museums throughout the country. A collection of five of her dresses are held at the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Three of them are on display at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington,DC. Several of her other dresses will be included in an exhibition on black fashion at the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in Manhattan in December 2016.

Black History Month: Elizabeth Keckley

With February being the month of love and the celebration of our black leaders I would like to share with you a black history fact each day of the month. I would normally recognize the normal leaders that everyone is aware off which is Martin Luther King, Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, Malcolm X and etc but this year I wanted to shine light on the famous African American designers during slavery.   

Today I would like to honor and share Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley( February 1818- May 1907)

Elizabeth Hoobs Keckley was a former slave who became a successful seamstress, civil activist, and author in Washington, DC. She was best known as the personal modiste and confidante of Mary Todd Lincoln, the First Lady. She moved to Washington in 1860 after buying her freedom for her and her son in St.Louis. She created an independent business in the capital based on clients who were wives of the government elite. Among the elite were Varina Davis, wife of Jefferson Davis; and Mary Anna Custis Lee, wife of Robert E.Lee. 

After the civil war she wrote and published an autobiography, Behind the Scenes: Or Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House in the year 1868. It was both a slave narrative and a portrait of the First Family, especially Mary Todd Lincoln, and it is considered to controversial for breaking privacy about them. It was also her claim as a businesswoman to be part of the new mixed-race educated middle class that was visible among the leadership of the black community. 

She was the founder of the Contraband Relief Association( August 1862). She received donations from both Lincolns as well as other white patrons and well to do free blacks. In July 1864 she changed the name to the Ladies Freedom and Solider's Relief Association. She wanted to reflect it's expanded mission after blacks served in the US Colored Troops. Her organization provided food, shelter, clothing and emotional support to recently freed slaves and/ or sick and wounded soldiers. Her organization was based in Washington, DC but the funds distributed and the services provided helped families in larger regions.  

Fun Fact: In 1867, Mrs Lincoln was deeply in debt becasue of her extravagant spending.  She asked for help by disposing of articles and old clothes. She was criticized for selling clothes and other items associated with her husband's presidency. When Elizabeth donated her Lincoln memorabilia to Wilberforce College for its sale in fundraising to rebuild after a fire in 1865. Mrs. Lincoln was angry with her action. 

In 1868 Elizabeth published Behind the Scenes , to "attempt to place Mrs. Lincoln in a better light before the world" and to explain the motives that guided her decisions regarding what became known as the "old clothes scandal". Elizabeth good friend Frederick Douglas helped her edit and publish her book. Her book received negative publicity so she wrote numerous letters to newspaper editors to defend her serious intentions. 

Elizabeth continued to  attempt to earn money by sewing and teaching young women her techniques even tho her white clientele stopped calling she eventually was in a great need of money. In the year 1890 she sold the Lincoln articles which she kept for thirty-five years. She sold twenty-six articles for $250 but it still remains a mystery how much she really received. 

In 1892 she was offered a faculty position at Wilberforce University as head of the Department of Sewing and Domestic Science Arts and she moved to Ohio. Within a year of her at the university she organized a dress exhibit at the Chicago World's Fair. By the late 1890's she returned back to Washington, DC and in May 1907 she died. 

Her legacy lives on throughout many museums.  The dress she designed for Mary Todd Lincoln to wear at the husband second inauguration is held by the Smithsonian's American History Museum.  Also a quilt made of scraps of materials left over from dresses she made for Mrs. Lincoln is being held by the Kent State University Museum. 

With the first day of Black History Month I would like to honor Elizabeth Keckley for her bravery and her amazing skill of dressmaking.