In 1930, designers like Edith Head and Elizabeth Arden created the Fashion Group in New York City to support women in the American fashion business by providing a network of professionals and resources. By 1937, the Pittsburgh Branch of the Fashion Group International formed as the 9th regional group. When World War II brought rationing to the United States, the Fashion Group of Pittsburgh (FGP) took on a public education role. Their 1942 publication “Conservation Begins with you” could be purchased at Gimbles, but soon spread to other department stores in the area. The pamphlet was filled with information aligned with the “make do and mend” wartime attitude. Fashion was a field which could remain women-focused, thusly the careers grew. Between 1947 and 1958, members consisted of professionals across women’s fashion from managers at Gimbles and fashionists at Kauffman’s to Post-Gazette Columnists and KDKA radio commentators.

Switching from publications to professional development after WWII, the FGP focused on providing seminars, lecture series, and fundraising events. Essay competitions based on the content of lecture series awarded local women with prizes like scholarship money. The 1947 Candlelight Cocktail Tea Party, with its 250 attendees, funded the first FGP collection development donation. The “fuller and longer skirts” described in the headline were key features of Dior’s New Look and the departure from rationing and practicality of wartime fashion.

The FGP donations may have inspired other fashion historians to donate their publications. The Little Sampler by Mary Julian Glover was donated in 1957 and contains historical makeup and skincare recipes alongside a breakdown of fashions between 1830 and 1908. Glover mentions purchasing her first antique blouse and says that “Research at the Library was the answer.” On the same intro page, sketches of women in the fashion section of a library show that fashion collections may have been common in the 19th and 20th centuries.

 

 

Starting around 1952, the FGP would host a Hatters’ Tea Party where various designers, including names like Hattie Carnegie and Gustave, displayed millinery following the theme for the year. The Hatters’ Tea Parties consistently raised the most money for the library’s collection.

 

 

Over a decade, the Hatters’ Tea Parties provided nearly $5,000, that’s $52,750 by 2024 standards, towards the Fashion Group of Pittsburgh’s collection development. The Pittsburgh Post Gazette often covered the event, with FGP member Francis Walker writing most of the features. In March 1955, Walker remarks on the recent purchase of reference books such as “Observations Sur Les Modes et les Usages Paris.” A reproduced sketch from the book titled “Atelier de Modistes” shows a series of milliners busy adorning their hats with ribbons and flowers. As a Pittsburgh Post Gazette photo shows, the book used to be individual pages but had been bound into one volume. This book translates to English as “Observations on Paris Fashions and Uses” and we quickly found this to be satire about the upper-class Parisians and their obsession with fashion.

Some of our favorite materials from the collection include the 1869 magazine “Illustration de la Mode,” Paul Louis de Giafferri’s 1922 book titled “L’Histoire du Costume Féminin Français : de l’An 1037 à l’An 1870,” and “Raccolta de Cento Costumi Antichi … Tomo 1” by Bartolomeo Pinelli.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Fashion Group of Pittsburgh showed immense pride in the funding and development of the collection by collaborating with the Carnegie Library art librarian Catherine Hay. CLP Director Ralph Munn was surprised by the number of requests for materials from the fashion reference collection and mentioned in an annual report how the collection received the second most requests behind science and technology. The University of Pittsburgh, the Pittsburgh Playhouse, Chatham University, and the Carnegie Institute of Technology are only a few examples of where the requests from students and professionals may have been coming from.

Silk and Steel: The Fashion Group of Pittsburgh is on display from September 2024 to January 2025 on the second floor of CLP – Main.

To find the Fashion Group of Pittsburgh items in the library catalog, search by author for “Fashion Group of Pittsburgh.”