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Night & Day
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The Museum at FIT presents Night & Day, a new exhibition examining how the rules that dictate appropriate dress for women have changed over the past 250 years. Featured will be more than 100 day and evening garments, textiles, and accessories that illustrate the conventions during various eras for proper attire for a particular time of day, activity, or occasion. Night & Day will reveal the evolution of the rules that govern fashion, including periods when strictly observed etiquette was the norm and other times when more flexible guidelines prevailed.
Following that introduction, the chronologically organized exhibition will begin with the eighteenth century, when clothing was classified by its degree of formality and worn according to the occasion or activity, such as attire for an evening in a formal drawing room versus the less formal setting of a country house.
As the exhibition progresses from the nineteenth to twenty-first centuries, day and evening clothes will be juxtaposed in pairs or small groups, illustrating what made each piece appropriate for a particular time of day. In addition to the changes in silhouette, these groupings will allow the viewer to see when the rules were at their most extreme or so subtle as to be barely perceptible.
The rules of dress reached their apex during the period from the turn of the twentieth century until World War I, when fashionable women were required to change their clothes up to six times per day, depending on their social obligations. A trio of dresses from the 1910s will show the still strict division between dressing for day and night.
After World War I, fashion permitted a more relaxed set of guidelines. Some of fashion’s traditional dress codes temporarily collapsed during World War II, partially due to wartime restrictions, but also because women had fewer opportunities for social and leisure activities. However, the war affected fashion differently in France and the United States.
Fashions of the 1950s again demanded a strict set of rules corresponding to a renewal of formal society. Day suits, afternoon and dinner dresses, as well as formal evening gowns, once again became essential elements of a fashionable woman’s wardrobe. The strictly delineated rules would all but disappear in the 1960s and 1970s. Day and evening clothes were well defined in the1980s, even while undercurrents of the avant-garde and post-modernism led to a multiplicity of styles.
True day suits, cocktail dresses, and evening gowns still exist, but contemporary fashion adheres to very few traditional rules and promotes loose definitions of daywear and eveningwear. Although a 2004 Rochas evening dress will illustrate the continuing legacy of fashion’s most stringent etiquette, the coat of a 2008 Calvin Klein ensemble, embellished with crystal paillettes, will again challenge our perception of what is appropriate for night and day.
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Scandal Sandals and Lady Slippers: A History of Delman Shoes
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The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) presents Scandal Sandals and Lady Slippers: A History of Delman Shoes, the first exhibition devoted to the Delman brand. Founded by Herman Delman in 1919 and today one of the oldest salon footwear brands in the United States, Delman’s glamorous, innovative, and classic shoes have been a cornerstone of the fashionable and quality-conscious woman’s wardrobe for the past 90 years. The company is known for embodying all that is chic, luxurious, and sophisticated. Scandal Sandals and Lady Slippers: A History of Delman Shoes will explore and reveal the company’s vibrant history of style, advertising, and fine craftsmanship.
Drawing from the permanent collections of both The Museum at FIT and the Delman archives, approximately 50 dazzling shoe styles will be presented alongside period examples of print advertisements, newsreel footage, and illustrated patents. These objects, dating roughly from 1926 to 2007, will chronicle the company’s rich history and creativity in both design and business.
Among the shoes on display will be a pair of multicolored, floral booties with a turn-back throat from the 1950s. Boldly original in their dramatic use of blue and purple hues, the booties draw attention to the lower leg. A pair of suede, instep strap sandals from circa 1939 performs a similar function. Boasting red, white, green, and blue color sections, four tiny bows are sequenced delicately down the vamp while a narrow ankle buckle strap, oval toe, and triangular heel maintain the shoe’s elegant silhouette.
Herman Delman, who specialized in building shoes that were chic, yet comfortable, believed that skilled construction was essential to the creation of a quality shoe. He also was keenly aware of the importance of style and employed several notable designers over the years, including Roger Vivier, Herbert Levine, and Kenneth Jay Lane, as a means of shaping not only the aesthetic of his company but also the tastes of fashionable women across the country. Scandal Sandals and Lady Slippers: A History of Delman Shoes will feature three decades of shoes designed by Roger Vivier, as well as a pair of circa 1965 white leather Mary Jane heels ornamented with multicolored embroidered flowers and conceived by Herbert Levine. Each of these examples represents the characteristic trends in women’s footwear that helped to define the fashion-conscious woman’s wardrobe.
Herman Delman’s savvy proficiency as a businessman and extroverted personality was frequently realized through his use of exquisitely illustrated advertisements and eye-catching window displays (the Delman store on Madison Avenue featured an oval window showcasing three cobblers at work), as well as his early understanding of the power of celebrity. His designs will forever be associated with iconic leading ladies of the Silver Screen. Marilyn Monroe, Joan Crawford, and Marlene Dietrich all wore Delman, while today celebrities such as Anne Hathaway, Blake Lively, and Leighton Meester are often spotted wearing the company’s designs at premieres and in photographs.
Delman’s enterprising use of celebrity played an integral role in his effort to market his shoes as an expression of the poised and idealized woman. He would often release ready-made copies of designs that had been made exclusively for movie stars. Scandal Sandals and Lady Slippers: A History of Delman Shoes will include ready-to-wear copies of the shoes Queen Elizabeth wore to her 1953 coronation, as well as Delman’s circa 2000 reinterpretation of the design. Also on display will be a pair of evening sandals from circa 1958 designed after Irene Castle’s “Scandal Sandal” dancing shoes. The metallic cord and leather detailing on the shoes beautifully complement the gold metallic high heel and make these evening shoes the perfect accessory for a night on the town.
Delman was also known for his custom-made shoe services. Among the shoes to be featured in the exhibition are a custom-made pair designed for Mrs. Carrie Munn. Married to a prominent publisher, Mrs. Munn opened her own dress shop on Madison Avenue in 1942 and was known for her extravagant parties at the Waldorf-Astoria. The surfaces of her closed-toe, velvet pumps, which are cleverly printed to resemble feathers, highlight her appreciation of fashion-forward design.
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