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Hattie move well, to move with the times and a little

“My clothes are built to show off the woman
who wears them. I like them to be simple... to

ahead of the times.” - Hattie Carnegie
Carnegie rom the 1920s through the 1940s,

Hattie Carnegie was the go-to
FAmerican fashion designer for the

tions. During her three-decade reign
rich and famous - and those with aspira-
leading a fashion empire, Hattie
Carnegie was associated with simple
elegance and high fashion. Her work
20th Century ranged from one-of-a-kind creations
for clients such as the Duchess of
Windsor, Clare Booth Luce, Tallulah
Bankhead, and Joan Crawford to
Fashion Entrepreneur designing uniforms for the Women’s Vintage 1950s
Army Corps., for which she received
the Congressional Medal of Freedom. figural Pegasus horse
Today, Carnegie's designs are in brooch by Hattie
the permanent collection of the Carnegie selling for
By Maxine Carter-Lome, publisher Metropolitan Museum of Art in New $100 at Etsy.com
York, the Shelburne Museum in
Vermont (Hattie Carnegie was Museum Founder Electra
Havemeyer Webb’s designer of choice), and the Museum of
Fine Arts Houston, among others. Not bad for an immigrant
and a woman at the turn of the century who went on to build
and run a fashion empire valued at $8 million (the equivalent
of $77.5 million today) at the time of her
death in 1956 at the age of 69.
Born Henrietta Kanengeiser to a poor
Jewish family from Vienna, Austria-Hungary
in 1886, Hattie was the second of seven
children born to Hannah and Isaac
Kanengeiser. The family immigrated to the
United States when Hattie was a young girl,
settling in the Lower East Side of Manhattan.
To help support her family, Henrietta took a
job as a messenger at Macy's at age 13 and
by 15, was modeling and trimming hats in
their millinery department, an experience
she would later parlay into her own
hat-making business.
As the story goes, Henrietta conceived
of the surname Carnegie while on the
ship to America. Hattie asked a fellow
voyager who the richest and most
prosperous people in America were and
the answer was, "Andrew Carnegie."
She formerly changed her name to
Hattie (supposedly a nickname given to
her because she made hats) Carnegie in
her mid-20s when she launched her
own business. Eventually, the rest of her family
dropped the Kanengeiser name, as well, and adopted Carnegie
as the family’s surname.

Inset: This nipped-waist dress is from the early 1950s is tailored from a silk
watercolor floral print in shades of pink, gray, white, lavender, and Carnegie
blue. The knee-length silhouette has a fitted sleeveless bodice and a skirt with
fullness formed from a pair of soft reverse pleats in the front and back. There
is a silk lining and metal zipper back closure. Selling on 1stDibs for $750.

“Hattie Carnegie Originals from hat to hem: Under a whirlwind
brimmer of licorice straw, a costume of beauty patches on sugar white
silk-and-cotton, ear clips of chunky jet, and the aura of Carnegie Four
Winds Cologne. (Costume only at Hattie Carnegie Ready to Wear Salons)
24 42 East 49th Street, New York”