Women Who Rock: Diana Vreeland
Posted by: Catherine Strawn
Filed in:
celebs
8:30AM, Monday March 2nd 2009
March is National Women’s History Month, and we’re celebrating by sharing a lady we admire each weekday.
DIANA VREELAND (c.1906-1989)
In 1936, the editor in chief of Harper’s Bazaar gave Diana Vreeland, a wife and mother of two, a job, even though she technically didn’t have any experience. Vreeland began telling women to live extraordinarily with her “Why Don’t You” column (a sample: “Why don’t you tie black tulle bows on your wrists?”). She influenced what women in America wore with her work as a fashion editor at Bazaar for 25 years before and then at Vogue, where she first worked as an associate editor before becoming editor in chief in 1963. During her reign, she shook up the fashion world by using women who looked like individuals (Lauren Hutton, Ali McGraw), and helped along the careers of now-infamous designers, including Oscar de la Renta. Vreeland always took chances and did the unexpected, and she hoped others would do the same with their clothing choices and the way they lived their lives.
Further Reading:
[Photo: AP]
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babsoil
wrote on March 2 2009 @ 11:18 pm: [report]
I do think it is important to talk about women that changed ideas and influenced women in the past….but out of all the activists and all the women that made REAL sacrifice you chose an editor of a women’s magazine that told us what to wear? Come on Frisky…you are better then this!
retro chic
wrote on March 5 2009 @ 01:59 pm: [report]
@ The Frisky folk: “Women Who Rock” articles are great—hope there new ones. Where’s the “March is National Women’s History Month” Banner? It’s only March 5. The links are enlightening.
I hope to see more comments or contributions… “just one a day—that’s all we ask.”
At Babs… Not everyone can be a Nobel Prize winner, or sacrifice a limb to earn recognition. What is YOUR contribution? Why discount ANY WOMAN’s contribution? It’s sad enough that we even have to HAVE a “National Women in History MONTH!” I’m sure a lot others have their favorites, too.
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In fact, I’ll see Frisky’s Vreeland or Valentina and raise ‘em one Chanel glove-slap.
COCO CHANEL (1883-1971)
As many already know… She emancipated women’s dress making a huge social and psychological impact. We enjoy more freedoms in part because Chanel scandalously “rocked” ‘n’ “ruled” the world with woman-independent comfort chic in the early 20th that we take for granted today:
* Hemlines hiked—from “Hobble” skirts allowing unrestricted walking
* Corsets sacked—fainting and femininity no longer synonymous
* Scaled-down proportions—replaced heavy, enslaving “costumes”
* High fashion—made available to all woman
* Costume jewelry—the great equalizer of masses of classes
* Chanel wore pants—scorning mandatory marriage with open affairs.
* Fashion standards—established visual and language iconography
* Chanel maxims—her words to live by that still hold up
Chanel’s a lot more than her creation of the yummy Tweed Suit or The Little Black Dress (fragrance, accessories and textiles, etc). She was the extreme of Rags to Riches, building a biz worth 9-figures at her death, and new thought for women. Clothes may make the man, but Chanel made the woman. And Prada wore it.
Related Reads and Links:
Bio book: Coco Chanel—Her Life and Secrets, 1972;
Bio link: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9244165
Quotes:
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/c/coco_chanel.html
babsoil
wrote on March 5 2009 @ 10:41 pm: [report]
I believe my comment was “I do think it is important to talk about women that changed ideas and influenced women in the past….” and then I went on to say that there are more deserving women in our History that deserve our praise…that did more for women’s rights then raise our hem lines. Good Post Retro Girl but I think you lost what I was trying to express.