News-Antique.com - Nov 30,-0001 - Friday, Feb 3,1:00PM to 8:00PM
Saturday, Feb 4,11:00 AM to 6:00 PM Metropolitan Pavilion 125 West 18th Street (6th & 7th Aves.) ADMISSION: $20. 518/434-4312 www.manhattanvintage.com
FALLEN GENIUS RISES AGAIN AT THE MANHATTAN VINTAGE CLOTHING & ANTIQUE TEXTILE SHOW
Designs by 70s Style-Setter, Ossie Clark, Inspire Today’s Hottest Looks
Imagine, if you will, the excitement, the furor when he first introduced his snakeskin fashion in the late 60s. Imagine, too, how coveted were his beautiful romantic dresses, with their flowing layers, yet strikingly graphic designs. He was one of those unforgettable talents – a formidable force behind the amazing success of the late 60s/70s “Boutique Culture,” that saw the ascendancy of London’s BIBA and Quorum boutiques to the heights of fashion influence. For more than a decade (from the 60s-70s), he dressed the famous and fashionable at a time considered to be London’s most rule-breaking, only to die neglected and penniless, murdered by a lover.
Now his look comes to the Big Apple in a major retrospective and sale of great Ossie Clark fashion, premiering at the city’s most sought-out vintage fashion event – the Manhattan Vintage Clothing & Antique Textile Sale, Feb. 3 & 4 at the Metropolitan Pavilion, New York City. It’s a real “British Invasion” and it couldn’t be more timely! The 70s influence is felt in all corners of the fashion world, with the abstract pattern design championed by Clark turning up today in the collections of such prominent designers as Giles Deacon, Matthew Williamson and Miu Miu – to name just a few.
What will we be shopping for as Spring approaches? Those romantic creations in chiffon, and rayon crepe that gave an abstract, painterly look to much of the fashion of the late 60s and 70s. Preview Spring 2006 fashion on the pages of Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue and you’ll be instantly catapulted back into the ethereal world of Ossie Clark—a world that was considered innovative and even shocking, to many of the more traditional fashion houses of the day.
The Manhattan Vintage Clothing & Antique Textile Sale’s salute to Ossie Clark will contain items from the collection of Mark & Cleo Butterfield of C20 Vintage Fashion in London. Many of the garments they will be bringing were recently exhibited in an Ossie Clark retrospective at London’s prestigious Victoria & Albert Museum. While specializing in Ossie Clark creations, the Butterfield’s also carry fashion from top designer names of the 50s-80s “British Boutique Movement,” including Thea Porter, Biba, Mary Quant, Bill Gib, Sandra Rhodes, Jeff Banks, Galliano and Vivienne Westwood. These designers will be well-represented in the upcoming sale.
Ossie Clark was first recognized as a design talent at the age of 23 when British Vogue singled him out in their August 1965 issue. That year, he went to work at Alice Pollock’s Quorum Boutique, along with textile designer Celia Birtwell, whom he later married. Together, the couple created beautiful garments that combined a number of romantic textiles – velvet, rayon, chiffon—in a single garment.
