Box 5

Scope and Contents Volume 7 contains coverage of Mainbocher's Fall/Winter 1946 and Spring/Summer 1947 collections. For fall, he showed several trend-making innovations, including the fur evening dress--a simple black dress trimmed in mink and chinchilla. His spring collection was hailed a "new fashion era" by New York Times fashion critic Virginia Pope. Mainbocher designed clothes with an absence of material and pattern restrictions. The final third of Volume 7 is miscellaneous coverage of the designer's...

Scope and Contents Volume 8 contains coverage of Mainbocher's Fall/Winter 1947 and Spring/Summer 1948 collections; his designs for elite weddings; and his role in dressing Wallis Simpson, the Duchess of Windsor, named one of the "Best Dressed Women of 1947." For fall, corsets were back. Mainbocher's collection was esentially a total recall of the past seven years executed in more opulent materials of post-war opportunity. He said the two key "battle-points" of fashion change were skirts and shoulders. For...