Charles James papers, 1704-1978 (bulk 1960-1978) Finding aid prepared by Celia Hartmann and Caitlin McCarthy This finding aid was generated using Archivists' Toolkit on August 21, 2019 The Costume Institute's Irene Lewisohn Costume Reference Library The Metropolitan Museum of Art 1000 Fifth Avenue New York, NY, 10028 [email protected] Charles James papers, 1704-1978 (bulk 1960-1978) Table of Contents Summary Information .......................................................................................................3 Biographical note.................................................................................................................4 Scope and Contents note.....................................................................................................6 Arrangement note................................................................................................................ 7 Administrative Information .............................................................................................. 8 Related Materials .............................................................................................................. 9 Controlled Access Headings............................................................................................... 9 Collection Inventory..........................................................................................................11 Series I. Business Ventures.........................................................................................11 Series II. Correspondence........................................................................................... 16 Series III. Designs....................................................................................................... 43 Series IV. Educational Projects...................................................................................82 Series V. Events and Exhibitions................................................................................99 Series VI. Museum Donations.................................................................................. 106 Series VII. Office Administration.............................................................................122 Series VIII. Personal Records................................................................................... 142 Series IX. Promotion and Publicity.......................................................................... 176 Series X. Research Materials.................................................................................... 192 Series XI. Writings....................................................................................................194 - Page 2 - Charles James papers, 1704-1978 (bulk 1960-1978) Summary Information Repository The Costume Institute's Irene Lewisohn Costume Reference Library Title Charles James papers, 1704-1978 (bulk 1960-1978) Dates 1704-1978 (bulk 1960-1978) Extent 185.0 Linear feet (130 full-size document cases, 1 half-size document case, 237 oversize boxes) Language English Abstract Charles James (1906-1978) was an Anglo-American couturier who designed most prolifically from the 1920s through the 1950s. Famously called America’s first couturier, he was largely self-taught, cultivating an idiosyncratic method and approaching his dressmaking with the eye of a sculptor or an engineer. The Charles James papers consist predominantly of his business and personal records from the late 1950s to his death in 1978, and focus on James’s endeavors to document and promote the impact he had during his design heyday of the 1930s-1950s. They show his effort to document the importance of his influence and designs, and his attempts to place such documentation in the collections of art museums, libraries, and historical societies in the United States. Original patterns and sketches of James's designs complement the holdings of finished garments in the collection of the Costume Institute. Preferred Citation note [Title of item], [date of item], Box [number], Folder [number], Charles James papers, The Costume Institute's Irene Lewisohn Costume Reference Library. - Page 3 - Charles James papers, 1704-1978 (bulk 1960-1978) Biographical note Charles James (1906-1978) was an Anglo-American couturier who designed most prolifically from the 1920s through the 1950s. Famously called America’s first couturier, he was largely self-taught, cultivating an idiosyncratic method and approaching his dressmaking with the eye of a sculptor or an engineer. James is credited as one of the first to use zippers, heat-set plastic boning, and down feathers in a fashion context. He has been called the inventor of the wrap dress and the infinity scarf, and at the height of his popularity James garments were some of the most expensive haute couture in the world. He dressed the socialites Millicent Rogers and Babe Paley, the actresses Marlene Dietrich and Jennifer Jones, and the performers Gypsy Rose Lee and Lily Pons, among many others. James was born in Surrey, England on July 18, 1906 to Colonel Ralph Ernest Haweis James, an English Army officer, and Louise Enders Brega James, a Chicago socialite. They raised Charles and his sisters Frances (b. 1904) and Margaret (b. 1907) in comfort at Agincourt House in Camberley, Surrey, England. He attended the elite boarding school Harrow in London, where he befriended classmate Cecil Beaton. Though apparently an uninspired student, James did participate in theatrical productions. James dropped out of Harrow, or was expelled, and failed to stick with any subsequent school, after which his father installed him in the Chicago offices of the electric utility Commonwealth Edison. He did not take to the job and quit soon thereafter to pursue millinery, opening his own shop under the name Boucheron with the help of his mother’s society connections. It was here that James became known for shaping hats right on his clients’ bodies, a practice he would soon carry into dressmaking. He moved from Chicago to New York briefly, and then to London by 1930, where he began designing garments under his own name. With some thanks to his childhood friend Beaton, now a successful fashion photographer, by the early 1930s James was receiving coverage in Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, and Women’s Wear Daily. He first declared bankruptcy in 1931, a sign of what would prove to be a lifetime of poor money management. James gained notice as he continued to experiment with form and material, moving between London and Paris to show his designs and work. By 1943 he was back in New York, where he was named Creative Director at Elizabeth Arden and put in charge of the fashion floor. His mother Louise, a source of support both emotional and financial, died in 1944, leaving him a small inheritance. He opened an atelier on Madison Avenue the next year. Around this time James became interested in exhibiting and donating his works to museums, an effort he would continue throughout his life. He forged a relationship in 1944 with the Brooklyn Museum’s Industrial Design Division (later the Edward C. Blum Design Laboratory) through curator Michelle Murphy. James’s first solo exhibition, “A Decade of Design for Millicent H. Rogers,” opened at the Brooklyn Museum in 1949. - Page 4 - Charles James papers, 1704-1978 (bulk 1960-1978) He was awarded two Coty American Fashion Critics' Awards: the womenswear award in 1950, and a special award for innovative cutting in 1954. That year he married Nancy Lee Gregory, who hailed from a wealthy Kansas City family; their son Charles Jr. was born in 1956 followed by their daughter Louise in 1957. During this time James established various business entities and pursued arrangements with retailers and manufacturers. Among the most tumultuous business relationships was that with Samuel Winston, to whom James had licensed his designs. James was sued for breach of contract in 1954, and countersued for breach of contract and design piracy; he won the lawsuit, but was left with a reputation for litigiousness and diminished finances. In addition, his own business endeavors faltered and in 1958 his assets were seized by the IRS for nonpayment of taxes. From the 1960s onward, James entered into what Jan Glier Reeder in Charles James: Beyond Fashion calls his “post-design period,” primarily focused on securing his reputation and legacy. In support of this goal, James spent much time and effort designing teaching curricula as well as seeking to donate both his garments and his records to art and historical institutions. Often citing a downturn in the quality of design school curricula (mirroring his low opinions of the fashion industry), James positioned his instructional approach as the enlightened alternative. James collaborated with the Brooklyn Museum to develop a program of seminars, combining both lecture and workshop, which in the fall of 1960 he debuted at the Pratt Institute and the Rhode Island School of Design. Around this same time he began a relationship with the Art Students League, which provided him space and support to design a centerpiece of his instruction projects: a three-dimensional “flexible sculpture” dress form. By 1961, James’s relationship with the Brooklyn Museum had soured as he accused its staff and trustees of withholding budget approvals and fundraising support for the seminar program, as well as mishandling his property. This legal and personal saga was a defining topic in the last decades of his life. Meanwhile, James directed characteristic