Identity area
Reference code
Title
Date(s)
- 1930s-1969 (Creation)
- bulk 1950-1969 (Creation)
Level of description
Extent and medium
16 linear feet, 8976 sketches
Fashion illustrations, manuscripts, proofs
Context area
Name of creator
Administrative history
Bergdorf Goodman began as a custom tailoring shop in 1901, named such after Edwin Goodman (1876-1953) bought out his partners in what had previously been the tailoring firm of Bergdorf and Voigt. Goodman had acquired a reputation for immaculate tailoring and an inspired understanding of cut and materials. Bergdorf Goodman expanded into ready-to-wear in 1923, but continued to offer custom clothing and millinery well into the 1960s. It was one of the last department stores to offer this service, indicative of the very wealthy clientele who favored Bergdorf Goodman and placed orders from around the globe. Primary couturier to New York society, Edwin Bergman and the Bergdorf Goodman custom salon also outfitted international royalty, Broadway and Hollywood stars, and the elites of Pittsburgh, St. Louis, and the West Coast, many of whom spent $100,000/year in the store. Bergdorf Goodman was known for the immaculate craftsmanship of its clothes, and later for furs.
The custom salon was never strictly profitable for Bergdorf Goodman because of the high cost of labor and materials, and the cost of research and buying trips to Paris and Italy. A 1951 Business Week article on the department store reported that the custom salon “has not made money since 1929.” The salon employed 3 top-notch designers, 115 dressmakers, 55 tailors, 14 dressers, a “string of saleswomen, models, and assistants,” not to mention the sketch-makers and watercolorists who produced the sketches that comprise most of this collection. But this boutique service raised the profile of the department store and the house designers who worked in the custom salon also contributed designs for Bergdorf Goodman’s ready-to-wear collection. Edwin Goodman has been credited with extending the construction techniques of higher-end garments (deep hems and cutting on the true bias) to ready-to-wear, and raising the standards for the mass manufacture of clothing in the United States.
Andrew Goodman (1907-1993) succeeded his father as President of the store in 1951 on the occasion of the store’s 50th anniversary, and remained active until 1975, three years after it became part of the Broadway-Hale department store chain. Bergdorf Goodman subsequently became a division of the Neiman Marcus group. The store has been at its present location at 58th Street and Fifth Avenue since 1928. Unlike other department stores, Bergdorf Goodman never expanded to include branches in the suburbs.
Bergdorf Goodman Inc. is a luxury goods department store based on Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. The company was founded in 1899 by Herman Bergdorf and was later owned and managed by Edwin Goodman, and later his son Andrew Goodman.
Archival history
Immediate source of acquisition or transfer
Gift of Andrew Goodman/ Bergdorf Goodman, 1971 June 9
(physical transfer of Bergdorf materials noted as August 1970 in documents in the B.H. Wragge collection accession folder)
Content and structure area
Scope and content
The Bergdorf Goodman Custom Salon sketches collection contains 8,976 pencil, ink, and watercolor sketches by staff artists representing clothing and millinery available in Bergdorf's custom salon. These garments were made to order either from designs purchased by special arrangement from the leading coutouriers of the day or from sketches by Bergdorf's then well known in-house designers. Representative designers include Dior, Balenciaga, Halson and Courreges. House designers include Leslie Morris, Mary Gleason, and Bernard Newman. There is a complete run from 1950 to 1969. In addition, there is a representative sampling of sketches from the 1930s and 40s.
In addition to the sketches, the collection contains preliminary manuscripts and galley proofs of Booton Herndon's book Bergdorf's on the Plaza (NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1956) as well as typescripts of his interviews with and about members of the Goodman family and with and about such key members of the staff as Ethel Frankau, Odna Brandeis, and house designers Bernard Newman, Leslie Morris, and Mary Gleason.
The last series contains the original finding aid for the collection.
Appraisal, destruction and scheduling
Accruals
System of arrangement
After having been arranged chronologically, the Bergdorf Goodman collection was reorganized by designer in late 2010, after SPARC observed that most people using the collection searched by designer. Within the folder or folders for each designer, the sketches have been arranged chronologically, by year and separated by season within a year when known or applicable.
Conditions of access and use area
Conditions governing access
Access is open to researchers by appointment at the Fashion Institute of Technology Library, Department of Special Collections and FIT Archives.
Conditions governing reproduction
The Department of Special Collections and FIT Archives does not own copyright for all material held in its physical custody. It is the researcher's obligation to abide by and satisfy copyright law (http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#108) when copying or using materials (including digital materials) found in or made available from the department. When possible, the department will inform a researcher about the copyright status of material, the researcher's obligations with regard to such material, and, wherever possible, the owner or owners of the copyrights. Any and all reproduction of originals is at the archivist's discretion.
Language of material
Script of material
Language and script notes
Physical characteristics and technical requirements
Pencil, ink, and watercolor sketches
Finding aids
Generated finding aid
Allied materials area
Existence and location of originals
The Library of the Fashion Institute of Technology, Department of Special Collections and FIT Archives, 27th St. at 7th Ave., NY, NY , USA, 10001
Existence and location of copies
Related units of description
Additional sketches from the Bergdorf Goodman Custom Salon are held by the Costume Institute Library at the Metropolitan Museum of art as well as the Brooklyn Museum.
Notes area
Alternative identifier(s)
Access points
Subject access points
Place access points
Name access points
- Bergdorf Goodman (New York, N.Y.) (Subject)
Genre access points
Description control area
Description identifier
Institution identifier
Rules and/or conventions used
AAT; ANSI; DACS; DCMI; ISAD(G); ISO; LoC; NISO; etc
Status
Level of detail
Dates of creation revision deletion
Series 1 April-May, 2011; Series 2 August- October, 2013
Language(s)
- English
Script(s)
- Latin
Sources
Archivist's note
Arrangement, description, and/or archival processing of Series 1 by Karla Nielsen and Series 2 by Allyn Young, FIT, NY, NY, USA. Finding aid data formatted for AtoM and uploaded by Chelsea Cates.