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Watanabe, Junya

(Encyclopedia)Watanabe, Junya, 1961–, Japanese fashion designer, b. Fukushima. He apprenticed at Rei Kawakubo's Comme des Garçons (1984), where he became a knitwear and menswear designer. Watanabe introduced his...

Ferber, Edna

(Encyclopedia)Ferber, Edna, 1887–1968, American author, b. Kalamazoo, Mich. Her novels portray the lives of a wide variety of Americans in a vigorous, colorful, and panoramic fashion. Among her best-known novels ...

Gernreich, Rudi (Rudolph)

(Encyclopedia)Gernreich, Rudi (Rudolph) gĕrnˈrīkh [key], 1922–85, American fashion designer, b. Vienna. In 1938, he fled to California, where he studied in Los Angeles. He worked as a dancer and costume design...

Klein, Calvin Richard

(Encyclopedia)Klein, Calvin Richard klīn [key], 1942–, American fashion designer, b. New York City. In 1968 he established Calvin Klein Limited, which produced clothes and accessories bearing his hallmark of sim...

corset

(Encyclopedia)corset, article of dress designed to support or modify the figure. Greek and Roman women sometimes wrapped broad bands about the body. In the Middle Ages a short, close-fitting, laced outer bodice or ...

Head, Edith

(Encyclopedia)Head, Edith, 1907–81, American costume designer, b. Los Angeles, Calif. She began to design costumes for the motion pictures in the early 1930s, working at Paramount for most of her career and movin...

Brummell, Beau

(Encyclopedia)Brummell, Beau (George Bryan Brummell) brŭmˈəl [key], 1778–1840, English dandy and wit. Brummell was greatly admired for his fastidious appearance and confident manner. He was an intimate of the ...

Castle, Vernon, and Irene Foote

(Encyclopedia)Castle, Vernon (Vernon Castle Blythe) 1887–1918, and Irene Foote, 1893–1969, husband-and-wife dance team. Vernon Castle was an English dancer, who studied civil engineering before turning to the s...

Karan, Donna

(Encyclopedia)Karan, Donna, 1948–, American fashion designer, b. Forest Hills, N.Y., as Donna Faske. Daughter of a tailor and a garment saleswoman, she started to design clothes as a teenager and studied at New Y...

Courrèges, André

(Encyclopedia)Courrèges, André äNdrāˈ ko͞or-rĕzhˈ [key], 1923–2016, French fashion designer whose designs were especially popular and influential during the 1960s. He worked for the couturier Cristóbal B...