Video Tour: Charles James at the Metropolitan Museum of Art

It's time for a trip to the Charles James exhibit currently up at the Metropolitan Museum of Art through August 10th. Charles James was the great American couturier who famously draped and shaped some of the most beautiful dresses created in the American haute couture. James, who was self-taught, designed in his native London before arriving in New York City in 1940. The designer was an artist whose medium was fabric and whose dresses were masterpieces. He was renowned for his striking color combinations, and his cut and construction, always refining and perfecting his living sculptures. But he was also eccentric and had a hard time running a business. The designer lived and worked in one room in the Chelsea Hotel on West  23rd Street. When he passed away there in 1978 at the age of 73 of pneumonia, he was largely unrecognized and unappreciated. However, his structured dresses with narrow waists and flaring skirts influenced Christian Dior when Dior created the New Look in the late 40's, and so though he is not a well-known household name, Charles James shaped the direction of fashion. 

Photo courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, photograph by Cecil Beaton. 
The exhibition was curated by Harold Koda and Jan Glier Reeder, and is located in two areas at the museum – in the new Anna Wintour Costume Center on the lower level as well as an exhibition gallery on the first floor. The show was designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, the New York architects we met at a book party at Ann Ziff's fine jewelry store.
Diller Scofidio + Renfro lit the clothes dramatically to highlight their shape. Charles James loved to combine different fabrics like deep, dark velvet and glossy, lustrous satin –

which is here worn by the great Babe Paley herself.

Photo courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 
Besides the clothes, there are on display accessories, drawings, videos, and some pithy quotes from Mr. James.

During the press preview for the exhibition, workers were preparing for the big Met Ball which was being held that very night. Here in the Great Hall, a kind of giant deconstructed Charles James ballgown made out of orange roses loomed over the entrance.

I had the pleaure of talking with the brilliant curator Harold Koda at the press preview, and my friend Scott Brasher made a video of the visit. Enjoy this nice long talk with Harold, and learn more about the great American fashion designer Charles James. 

"American Woman" at the Costume Institute

I was invited this week to preview the new show "American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity" at the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Curated by Andrew Bolton, this show is the first at the Met to feature clothes from the Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection which transferred to the Met in 2009. It promised to show how American style developed from 1890 to 1940 by organizing eras into iconic archetypes like the Heiress, the Bohemian, the Flapper, and the Screen Siren. You might remember that I attended the Fashion Institute of Technology's recent exhibit on American style and its accompanying seminar, so I was looking forward to seeing this new show, made possible by support from the Gap and Conde Nast.

I thought you might enjoy a tour through it too so we videoed the visit on the Canon. TD came with me to be the camera man. You know that videos are new here at Bart Boehlert's Beautiful Things, and I think it's time for a video camera! Any recommendations would be appreciated. The galleries were a little dark, and the background noise is a little loud, but you'll get the idea here. Lean in and listen to what Anna Wintour has to say!

An Ode to the Cardigan

Michael Kors, Spring 2008

Recently, Mr. Peacock interviewed me on his blog and asked me what my favorite article of clothing was. Later I thought, I should have mentioned the cardigan, the sweater that buttons up the front.
I love cardigans, and I always have:

That's me, age two or three, in a scan of a xerox of a photo, but you get the idea. Cardigan sweater, white shirt, wool trousers; that is what I am still wearing today.

Named after the English Lieutenant General James Thomas Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan (1797 – 1868), who made the knitted waistcoat fashionable, the cardigan is a classic that has recently come back into style again and I'm glad of it because I've been wearing them for years.

When I first moved to New York City I worked as a chauffeur for Mr. Perry Ellis, but that's another story. Though I will say that's where I first met friend Richard Haines who has a great blog, What I Saw Today. After that job I worked as a communications assistant at CBS Magazines and one day I was in the elevator with Ellen Levine, who was then the editor in chief of Woman's Day magazine. She pulled her glasses down to the tip of her nose and eyed my navy blue cardigan -- hand knit with a ship's wheel logo and shiny gold buttons.
"Paul Stuart?" she said.
"Perry Ellis," I said. I was a young assistant wearing designer clothes that I had bought at a sample sale. I still have that sweater. Let's see if I can pull it out of the hope chest that my great aunt Kay gave me...
Yes, here it is:


I am keeping this sweater, unless Harold Koda wants it for the Metropolitan Museum Costume Institute.

While I was in the chest I came across this cardigan which has a Fair Isle pattern and silver metal buttons.

I love this sweater which belonged to my uncle Brian, who is a lawyer in Albany and has wonderful style. He gave it to me and I wore it when I was in law school, but that's really another story.

At CBS Magazines, I also had a pale pink linen and silk Perry Ellis sweater, pictured below -- a summer version of a cardigan. I kept this one too. I don't hold on to a lot of clothes, but I have my Perry Ellis sweaters.


This is me working at Hearst New Media where I was the online style editor in the 90's. Cardigan sweater plus Hermes scarf.


With their buttons, cardigans are kind of like a jacket, but more comfortable and fluid than a jacket. Cardigans can be buttoned or unbuttoned depending on the temperature so they are more versatile than crew neck or v-neck sweaters. And they have more polish than a zip up sweater. You can tuck a short scarf into cardigan, and wear them with everything from jeans to a suit jacket. Cardigans are best when they are in a fine fabric like merino wool, and fit close to the body. If they are too big and bulky it can look like Mr. Rogers. Worn with a French cuff shirt and horn rim glasses, they have a slightly professorial air which I like too.

Here is actor Hugh Dancy in chic Gucci clothes in GQ magazine; photo by Nathaniel Goldberg.

We're back to a cardigan sweater, white shirt, wool trousers. He reminds me of Jude Law in The Talented Mr. Ripley, very 50's. Cardigans are casual sweaters but the deep v-neck and the drape of the buttons give them an elegant aspect; they're kind of Chanel-ish. Simple and soigne at the same time, they are open and easy and conducive to personal style. Fashion legend Polly Mellen told me that when she was a girl at Miss Porter's School in Connecticut she had a Brooks Brothers cardigan. But she wore hers backwards.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute

The Costume Institute at the Met has put its large collection of clothing into an online database that you can search which is really fun to browse through. Click on Collection Database and type in a keyword like Chanel of Yves Saint Laurent. Go here.
You can also click on Collection Highlights for access to popular pieces. The beautiful dress pictured above is from Lanvin, 1924; it kind of looks like Dries Van Noten's collection, which I wrote about below, doesn't it?

This dress is from Worth, 1925. Some French designers just last week showed similar designs that are short in the front and long in the back.


This is Callet Soeurs, 1924. So simple and chic, it could easily be worn today.


Last year, Harold Koda, curator in charge of the Costume Institute and an old friend, gave me a behind the scenes tour through the archives. The clinical white doors and drawers of the archive had been opened to reveal the treasures within, including the earliest garment they have -- an English dress from the 1690's, pale floral eighteenth century French and English dresses, Fortuny dresses twisted up into jewel-like knots, the dusty blue hat which the Duchess of Windsor wore on her wedding day. It was very special tour, and it happened to be on my birthday -- a beautiful birthday present.