September 16, 2024 – Oct 15, 2024
Between 1930-1939, while the world was in a series of crises and the global economy fell to the floor, fashion and the fine arts turned to dreams, romanticism, and nature for inspiration and escape, blending them together to echo the voices of Surrealism. The woman’s body was transformed to reflect the natural volume and curves of nature, thus taking on the illusion of the flower. Developments in fashion technology and collaboration with visual artists brought about prints and colors never seen before, often mimicking the beauty of the flower on a two-dimensional stretch of fabric. The bias cut, attributed to Parisian designer Madeleine Vionnet, embraced each curve of the woman’s body with delicately placed petal-like panels. The result: silhouettes that moved like lilies swaying gently in the wind, and the illusion of a life beyond the darkness of the decade. We invite you to explore the floral arrangement of print, pattern, and form by fashion icons Chanel, Lanvin, Vionnet and Schiaparelli, whose creations bloomed in the 1930s and are preserved in the archives of the Parodi Costume Collection.
