On Oct. 4, the university’s Department of Fashion and Apparel Studies hosted a panel discussion on the life and legacy of Black fashion designer Ann Lowe in Trabant Theater. Lowe was an American couturier who designed custom glamorous gowns for debutantes, actresses and brides. Most famously, Lowe created Jacqueline Kennedy’s iconic wedding dress.
A pioneer of her generation, Lowe served as a notable couturier who worked from the 1910s to the 1960s while remaining widely under-recognized. In 1964, The Saturday Evening Post labeled Lowe as society’s best kept secret. Today, fashion professionals are working to change this narrative and highlight the works of the late couturier.
The panelists at the discussion included Elizabeth Way, the associate curator of the Fashion Institute of Technology’s museum; Shawn Baron Pinckney, an American designer; and CaSandra Diggs, the president of the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA).
Way is a guest curator of the current exhibition, “Ann Lowe: American Couturier,” which is at the Winterthur Museum in New Castle County, Delaware. It debuted Sept. 9 and will be open until January of 2024. The exhibition showcases the largest collection of Lowe’s work to date with 40 of her iconic designs.
When asked his favorite piece of Lowe’s, designer Pinckney noted a mixed lace wedding gown that reminded him of Christian Lacroix in the 1990s and Givenchy in the mid-2000s. This gown was Elizabeth Mance’s, a member of a prominent Black American family in the 1960s. Not only did Lowe design this wedding dress and the attire of the entire wedding party, but she attended the wedding as well. Lowe herself named this one of the proudest moments of her career.
Way reminded the audience that this was not always given a for Lowe.
“In her twenties, [Lowe] has made hundreds of wedding gowns, and she goes to these weddings to do last minute adjustments, make sure everything’s good, but she dresses in a maid uniform,” Way said. “She’s working in the Jim Crow South in Tampa, Florida, and that’s how she presents herself in these elite white spaces.”
Lowe was born in Clayton, Alabama, to a family of experienced dressmakers. According to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, she learned how to sew from her mother and grandmother, who was born enslaved.
Her ancestral history was carried through every seam. In the beginning of her career, Lowe experienced numerous racial roadblocks that kept her out of the spotlight and prevented her from getting the credit she deserved as a designer and couturier.
While working at Sonia Gowns, Inc., a reputable fashion brand based in New York City, Lowe created an original hand-painted dress that Olivia de Havilland wore at the 1946 Academy Awards. It was not until later into the 1960s, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, that Lowe identified herself as the designer.
Diggs connected the experiences of Lowe to those of Black designers today.
“I think in terms of a level of visibility for designers of color, especially Black designers, it is difficult to get the exposure,” Diggs said. “So while things are different and better, there’s still some areas in terms of how people invest in those designers that definitely need to change and improve.”
The legacy of Lowe is profound, and her perseverance paved the way for designers today. She was able to set a precedent as a Black female designer and embody the traditional couturier.
“She was a couturier, she made things custom, and, of course, there’s still people making custom work, but we really think of the modern industry as ready to wear,” Way said. “I really think of her as a pivot point between how American fashion changes between the 1920s [and] late 20th century.”
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