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| Anne Lowe (seated) and model. |
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Long forgotten and unknown to many, Ann Cole Lowe was a pioneer fashionista who paved the way for African-Americans to not only design, but to own, manufacture and produce in the fashion industry----long before it was fashionable to do so.
A trailblazer in fashion whose name has fallen through the cracks of history, Ms. Lowe was born in 1898 ----the daughter and granddaughter of celebrated seamstresses who were known for sewing for the first ladies of Alabama.
Ann and her mother moved to New York, where her mother operated a small dressmaking shop. In 1912, Anne married at the age of 14. After her mother's sudden death, Anne took over the business when she was 16. By 1917, Anne was enrolled in a fashion school in New York City. After graduating, she moved to Tampa, Florida and opened a small studio.
Ms. Lowe later returned to New York, where she worked as a commissioned designer for some of the major houses in the Fashion District. During that time she was never mentioned or given credit for her designs.
She pressed on, and soon she was designer to such families as the duPonts, Roosevelts, Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, and notably, she designed and made the gown actress Olivia de Haviland wore when she received an Oscar for the movie, "To Each His Own."
Of course, they all loved her work. She was known as "society's best kept secret," because no one would admit their clothing was being designed by a Black woman. I can't help but wonder how different her life and career would have been today. Maybe she would have been as well known and as wealthy as Vera Wang.
Anne Lowe's quiet claim to fame, however, was the wedding gown she designed for Jacqueline Bouvier in 1953, when she married John F.Kennedy. The dress consisted of 50 yards of ivory silk taffeta, with a full bouffant skirt had interwoven tucking bands and tiny wax flowers. It took Ms. Lowe two months to make that dress, along with 10 pink bridesmaid's gowns and hats.
Her skill as an ultimate professional was put to the test when, less than two weeks before the wedding a water line broke, flooding the store and ruining the gown. She worked around the clock to recreate the gown and complete all 10 bridesmaid dresses. Although the wedding received much attention in all the newspaper of that time, Ann didn't. Nina Hyde, the social/fashion editor of the Washington Post at the time, wrote: "… the dress was designed by a Negro, Ann Lowe."
In 1962, while undergoing surgery to remove one of her eyes due to glaucoma, Anne's shop was seized by the IRS because of back taxes. Upon her release from the hospital, she learned that her debt had been paid by an anonymous benefactor. It is suspected that first lady Jackie Kennedy may have have paid the back taxes.
In her 70's, Ms. Lowe opened a store inside of Saks Fifth Avenue, and then her own studio, ("Anne Lowe Originals"), making over 2,000 dresses for New York's society. She was awarded the Couturier of The Year Plaque, appeared in the National Social Directory, and the "Who's Who of American Women". Ms. Lowe retired in the 1970's.
In 1981, Anne Cole Lowe died at the age of 83. She is well known in the fashion industry for her detailed needle technique. Her fashions can be seen in a permanent collection at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, Washington, D.C.'s Black Fashion Museum, and the Smithsonian.
In 1997, the John F. Kennedy Library Museum had Jackie Kennedy's wedding gown restored---exactly as Ms. Lowe had originally created it.
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