This was 1960 when Kennedy was in the White House and all sorts of interesting things were happening. Shortly after my arrival at Glamour, they named Melanie Miller fashion editor and she admired Donald's things.

He had just moved to a new operation and was working for Townley. This is the company that had previously employed Claire McCardell who had just died. Donald was the heir apparent for this company and he had started turning out dresses the likes of which were absolutely incredible.

I loved all of them. I couldn't afford them all but I managed in a period of about 2 or 3 years to purchase quite a bit of his merchandise. It was the fit, the way he used fabric and his sense of color that was particularly exciting. You don't see too much of it today, unfortunately.

Maybe you see it on the couture level but this was not couture - this was affordable. It is what you would call a bridge operation today. It was something that was promoted very strongly by Lord & Taylor and Dorothy Shaver at the time. It exemplified the American Look, which is what Lord & Taylor was all about.

His knowledge and use of fabric is most exceptional. A lot of designers can draw pretty pictures and then hand them to somebody in the back room who will turn out a garment but Donald knew how to drape and he treated fabric like it was modeling clay.

He could cut on the bias and make all sorts of nips and tucks and shapes that really enhanced a female figure and showed its best lines. I happen to know at the time that Jacqueline Kennedy was also a big fan of his.

As I mentioned before, his color sense was absolutely extraordinary in the way he picked and blended them. He was interested in the kind of fabrics that were pliable. He always used wool jerseys, silk linens, very soft fabrics such as basket weave wools and knits and he liked unusual prints.

In one of his spring collections, he had an Oriental style group of silk prints. He liked animal prints such as leopard and I own one of his leopard two-piece dresses. The sad part of everything was that this was just a very short period.

previous | overview | next