“Now that fashion has become an art, a fashion gazette must also be an art revue. So it will be with Gazette du Bon Ton.”—Lucien Vogel, 1886–1954 Pictured alone against a bare backdrop, the young woman of this fashion illustration sports a cloche hat and a sleek black and white coat with a voluminous collar...
American jazz and popular dance tunes- for the foxtrot and other 1920’s and 30’s dances, dominated nightlife and entertainment in the movies and live performance.
This 1947 book cover for The Great Gatsby was designed by Alvin Lustig (American 1915–1955) as part of the New Classics project. Initiated in 1939 by New Directions Publishing, the New Classics project created a series of cutting edge reprints of classic novels. When F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel was first published in 1925, it garnered...
The first non-stop, first transatlantic flight of Charles Lindbergh from New York to Paris in May 1927 was acclaimed around the world as one of the most remarkable and heroic accomplishments in history. The people of Paris were especially excited about the journey since their city was where Lindbergh would be touching down after nearly...
This illustration is featured in a book of poems by James Weldon Johnson titled, God’s Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse. Published in 1927, it emulates traditional African-American religious oratory. The seven sermons were inspired by memories of sermons by black preachers heard by Mr. Johnson while growing up. Johnson described the trombone as “the...
In the 1920s, the New York department store was an early promoter and exhibitor of European modernism and a distiller of these new styles for the American consumer. Good Furniture magazine reported in 1928 that “Lord and Taylor has taken a very definite step forward toward the actual placing of modern furniture in American homes.”[1]...
In this fabric, designer Jean Beaumont uses a lush pattern of oversized exotic florals and foliage, interspersed with stylized animal and human figures, to call forth an idyllic scene of paradise on earth. This, however, is a fleeting paradise, as the female figure (Eve) hands the forbidden fruit to the male (Adam). This sophisticated evocation...
Jazz musician Victor Goines is the featured speaker for this year's Morse Historic Design Lecture Series.
James Stalzman of the Manhattan School of Music discusses the musical pieces he paired with particular objects from The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s.
