This lovely lady is Helen ‘Curl’ Harris – an original Swing Fashionista! She was an entrepreneur at a time when women (let alone African-American women) were a rarity in business. A self-made graduate of the Skidmore Vocational School and the Philadelphia Charm and Model School, she ran and operated numerous beauty businesses in Philadelphia (Curl’s Beautyrama, Curl’s Beauty Salon and Charm Service, and Curl’s Moderne Beautyrama) as well as created her own line of make-up and hair products. Ella Fitzgerald and Josephine Baker were among her clients.
I just posted this video up on , where I was geeking out about the 1939 New York World’s Fair. But I thought the Swing Fashionistas might be interested in it also, because it’s color footage of everyday girls dancing in 1939. Enjoy!
This beautiful shoot entitled Paris Je T’aime from the 2007 Vogue September issue was photographed by Steven Meisel, and styled by Grace Coddington. The models are Coco Rocha, Guinevere Van Seenus, Caroline Trentini, Sasha Pivovarova, Gemma Ward and Agyness Deyn.
Grace Coddington is in fact Vogue’s Creative Director, and is in charge of most of the fashion shoots. If you’re interested in her (and the almighty Anna Wintour) and Vogue in general, then you might want to check out the new documentary, The September Issue:
I haven’t seen it yet, but reviews are good, and it sounds like Grace Coddington is as much the star as Anna Wintour herself. In the New York Times, the director R.J. Cutler said, “[Anna] is cool, [Grace] is warm and languid,” he said. “Anna is all about ‘next,’ and Grace is most interested in a historical perspective on art and fashion.” Sounds like our kind of lady!
Here’s a fun article on the subject over at Gawker:
is an Australian handmade jewelery company, and their ‘Third Time’s The Charm’ collection has a vintage twist. I’m not in love with all the pieces, but the photo shoot is gorgeous (well done to stylist Monica Buch), and I love the idea of jewelery made from vintage playing cards and antique umbrella silk. From the website:
“An anthology of accessories for style success in bold black and white, with a dash of cream and a splash of red. Theres a Charleston good-time girls’ influence, with tomorrow’s twist. Gleaming pearls are teamed with glossy obsidian and onyx, or contrasted prettily with hand-crafted vintage playing card butterflies that appear to have fluttered down to perch perfectly on the neck & wrist in a display of delicate symmetry. Beautiful black recycled umbrella silk teamed with pearls becomes a stylish bowtie choker, and the Lady Luck necklace of vintage dice is perfect with obsidian cubes. Eye-catching elegance is the key, allowing the wearer to be effortless in making her style statement.”
Anna May Wong (January 3, 1905 – February 2, 1961) was an American actress, the first Chinese American movie star, and the first Asian American to become an international star. Her long and varied career spanned both silent and sound film, television, stage, and radio.
Born near the Chinatown neighborhood of Los Angeles to second-generation Chinese-American parents, Wong became infatuated with the movies and began acting in films at an early age. During the silent film era, she acted in The Toll of the Sea (1922), one of the first movies made in color and Douglas Fairbanks’ The Thief of Bagdad (1924). Wong became a fashion icon, and by 1924 had achieved international stardom.
Frustrated by the stereotypical supporting roles she reluctantly played in Hollywood, she left for Europe in the late 1920s, where she starred in several notable plays and films, among them Piccadilly (1929).
She spent the first half of the 1930s traveling between the United States and Europe for film and stage work. Wong was featured in films of the early sound era, such as Daughter of the Dragon (1931) and Daughter of Shanghai (1937), and with Marlene Dietrich in Josef von Sternberg’s Shanghai Express (1932).
In 1935 Wong was dealt the most severe disappointment of her career, when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer refused to consider her for the leading role in its film version of Pearl S. Buck’s The Good Earth, choosing instead the European Luise Rainer to play the leading role in “yellowface”. Wong spent the next year touring China, visiting her family’s ancestral village and studying Chinese culture. In the late 1930s, she starred in several B movies for Paramount Pictures, portraying Chinese-Americans in a positive light. She paid less attention to her film career during World War II, when she devoted her time and money to helping the Chinese cause against Japan. Wong returned to the public eye in the 1950s in several television appearances as well as her own series in 1951, The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong, the first U.S. television show starring an Asian-American. She had been planning to return to film in Flower Drum Song when she died in 1961, at the age of only 56.
The world’s most famous Lindy Hop troupe in history. Manager (and former Savoy Ballroom bouncer) Herbert ‘Whitey’ White – is the man in the middle. The troupe was performing at the New Cotton Club in Culver City, California while filming ‘A Day at the Races’ with the Marx Brothers.
Leonardo Di Caprio (playing Howard Hughes), Jude Law (playing Errol Flynn), John C. Reilley and Alec Baldwin all get the vintage treatment in The Aviator. Slicked hair, red carpet-worthy tuxedos, 1940s suits and of course, plenty of leather aviator jackets.
I’ve finally got around to posting up some photos of well-dressed folks at Frankie Manning’s 95th Birthday celebrations in New York in May this year. Sorry for the delay, and remember, if you have any photos from this or any swing event, of swing girls OR guys looking fine, then email them through!
