Italian fashion designer Elsa Luisa Maria Schiaparelli (1890-1973) is regarded as one of the most prominent figures in fashion between the two World Wars. Having left her couture house in Paris before the Nazi occupation, Schiaparelli spent most of the WWII years on a lecture tour throughout the U. S. She returned to Paris after the war but found that fashions had changed, and she closed the couture house down in 1954, living out a comfortable retirement in Paris and Tunisia.
This image of Schiaparelli was likely taken during her visit to Seattle to deliver her “Clothes Make The Woman” lecture on November 12, 1940 at the Washington Athletic Club in downtown Seattle.
Caption information source: The Seattle Daily Times, November 13, 1940, page 7
ID Number: 1986.5.41397.1
Date: 1940
Physical Description: 1 acetate negative : b&w ; 4 x 5 in.
Additional Information: Digital copy of this item available thanks to funding from a 2016 Institute for Museum and Library Services grant.
