Diana Vreeland
from DIANA VREELAND by Eleanor Dwight
Book Design by Elizabeth Avedon
Book Design by Elizabeth Avedon
Diana Dalziel, 1911 "I have always had a wonderful imagination, I have thought of things that never could be..." –Diana Dalziel diary
Diana Vreeland
Photograph (c) Louise Dahl- Wolfe /All Rights Reserved
Photograph (c) Louise Dahl- Wolfe /All Rights Reserved
Diana's friend Horst P. Horst photographed her in her "Garden in Hell." As she said in DV, "All my life I've pursued the perfect red. I can never get painters to mix it for me. It's exactly as if I'd said, 'I want Rococo with a spot of Gothic in it and a bit of Buddhist Temple' – they have no idea what I'm talking about. About the best red is to copy a child's cap in any Renaissance portrait." Photograph (c) Horst P. Horst
"There's an excellent profile in Interview in which Jeanne Moreau says: "I shall die very young." "How young?" they ask her. "I don't know, maybe seventy, maybe eighty, maybe ninety. But I shall be very young." – DV
Legendary fashion arbiter, Diana Vreeland, born Diana Dalziel in Paris in 1906 to an American socialite mother and British father, married businessman Reed Vreeland, and with their two young children, moved to London, where they spent six years. Vreeland made frequent visits to Paris; and befriended designers such as Patou, Schiaparelli and Chanel. Returning to the states in 1935, Vreeland wrote an inventive column for Harper's Bazaar, "Why Don't You?" and later became a top editor there. Vreeland photographed models in Frank Lloyd Wright homes instead of in staged studios. In 1963, she became Vogue's editor-in-chief during the "Swinging Sixties" youth quake era, traveling to exotic locales in Africa, India, Turkey, China, Japan, and South America with famed models of the time Jean Shrimpton, Veruschka, Penelope Tree and Twiggy. In 1971, Vreeland became the consultant to the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute, creating the most exquisite exhibitions; "The Glory of the Russian Costume" prepared with Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis; "Diaghilev: Costumes and Designs of the Ballets Russes"; "Imperial Style: Fashions of the Hapsburg Era"; "Yves Saint Laurent: 25 Years of Design"; "The Eighteenth-Century Woman", among many others. Mrs. Vreeland lived an artistic life, always fashionable and immensely creative. She died in 1989.
An illustrated Biography
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