Acquisitions + Collections

IGNITING THE FASHION WORLD

American designer Bonnie Cashin’s ideas — radical when introduced — have become timeless

WHO WAS BONNIE CASHIN? An inscription in her senior yearbook provided a hint of things to come: “To a kid with spark — may you set the world on fire.” She did. By the 1950s, Bonnie Cashin had become “a mother of American sportswear” and one of the most influential fashion designers of the 20th century.

Born in 1908 in California, Cashin apprenticed in her mother’s custom dress shop. At 16, she began designing chorus costumes for a Hollywood theater. Next stop — the Roxy Theatre in New York City, where the 25-year-old was the sole designer. Her street clothes for a fashionthemed revue led to a job at the prestigious ready-to-wear firm Adler & Adler in 1937. After a few years there, Cashin left for California in 1943, where she spent six years at 20th Century Fox designing costumes for approximately 60 films.

Back in New York in 1949, Cashin created her first ready-to-wear collection under her own name. She designed for “the woman who is always on the go, who is doing something.” She introduced the concept of layering, with each piece designed to work in an ensemble, alone and in different combinations. The fashion world took notice. In 1950, Cashin won both the prestigious Coty American Fashion Critics’ Award and the Neiman Marcus Fashion Award.

Cashin opened her own firm, Bonnie Cashin Designs, in 1952. A one-woman enterprise, she insisted on total creative control as she worked with the manufacturers who produced her designs. Cashin chose craftsmanship over commercial success. And she never wavered in her artistic vision — functional simplicity and elegant solutions.

Bonnie Cashin created dazzling costumes for the stage and screen and then excelled at exquisite minimalism in her sportswear. The intersection? Cashin’s garments always moved with the wearer and were designed to be set against a backdrop — whether a theatrical scene or contemporary life.

Innovative and influential, Cashin continued to design until 1985. Following her death in 2000, among the handwritten notes jotted on scraps of paper in her apartment was one that read, “How nice for one voice to ignite the imaginations of others.”

— JEANINE HEAD MILLER, CURATOR OF DOMESTIC LIFE

ONLINE See Bonnie Cashin garments, including signature wool jackets, leather pants and a cashmere sweater, in The Henry Ford’s Digital Collectionsc

YOU’VE GOT THE LOOK

Many Bonnie Cashin designs were practical solutions to problems she herself experienced. Her tailored poncho was born after she cut a hole in a blanket to cope with temperature fluctuations while driving her convertible through the Hollywood Hills. Cashin was well-known for her innovative use of leather, mohair, suede, knits and nubby fabric as well as heavy hardware used as fastenings. She had a deep love of color and texture, and she personally selected, designed or commissioned her fabrics.

Traveling widely during her career, Cashin also closely studied the traditional clothing of other cultures. Her international focus and attention to refining traditional shapes down to their most modern and mobile forms led to her distinctive “Cashin Look.”

DID YOU KNOW? / The Oscar-winning films Laura (1944, above), Anna and the King of Siam (1946) and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) are among the 60 films Bonnie Cashin designed costumes for during her short six-year tenure at 20th Century Fox.

dFashion pioneer Bonnie Cashin (above) introduced the concept of layering, creating pieces like this weathered gray wool coat, wool jersey dress and orange leather jacket and trouser set to work as interchangeable ensembles.

©2022 PHOTOS COURTESY AUGUSTA AUCTION CO.; PHOTO OF BONNIE CASHIN BY BETTMANN/CONTRIBUTOR/GETTY IMAGES