Fit 2 Stitch

Peggy Sagers: Oscar de la Renta was a renowned Dominican-American fashion designer who built a globally recognized brand.

His career, spanning over five decades, saw him dress five first ladies including Jackie Kennedy, Nancy Reagan, Hillary Clinton, Laura Bush, and Michelle Obama.

He initially pursued painting before discovering his passion for fashion illustration.

He received multiple accolades and launched his own ready-to-wear label in 1965.

Today on "Fit 2 Stitch," we meet Oscar de la Renta through his works.

male announcer: "Fit 2 Stitch" is made possible by Kai Scissors, Reliable Corporation, Bennos Buttons, Plano Sewing Center, Elliott Berman Textiles, and WAWAK Sewing Supplies.

Peggy: Many years, I've bought fabrics in New York, and I remember one time asking my fabric guy, "Can you give me any designer?

Like, can I tell you what I want and you can get it for me?"

He goes, "Yeah, but don't go crazy.

Like, I can't get Oscar."

And I'm like, "As in Oscar de la Renta, you can't get?"

He goes, "Yeah, no, that stuff's untouchable.

You can't do that."

So it's interesting to know the levels of designers that exist in the United States and how that happens.

Annette is here today to share the knowledge of not just Oscar de la Renta but that transformative years of so much of this that took place.

Because I think that time sequence is really interesting.

Annette Becker: Yeah, Oscar de la Renta is an incredible figure whose legacy spans decades.

He was born in the Dominican Republic, did his early years in the fashion design industry in Paris, learning with some of the world's most famous couturiers, making custom garments, and then, I think, decided he wanted his designs to have greater access for people, and you could make more money working in the American fashion industry.

So he came to New York in the 1960s, and the pieces we have to share today are from the 1990s, really when he was well invested in his career.

Peggy: Wow, that is interesting, quite a few years later.

So all of those years, when did he come to the United States, to New York, was what year?

Annette: It was in the late 1960s.

He came and started working, I think, for Elizabeth Arden, which was a company that made ready-to-wear clothing.

Then I think he worked for Maurice Rentner and was able to open his own brand.

And actually, I lie: Maurice Rentner was with Bill Blass.

So, yes, I am telling lies right now.

Peggy: So all of that-- and we would not know that.

But it's interesting, all the influences.

And I think sometimes when we look at designers and we say, "Oh, you know, they made it big," we don't really realize how many years they spent getting there.

Even 1965 to 1990s, that's 25 years.

That's a long time.

Annette: It's so true, and even the early years are important for Oscar de la Renta because he was one of the first American designers to work in the couture system as a lead creative director or designer.

So if he hadn't had those early years working in couture in his 20s, he would not have been able to launch himself in New York in the 30s and then wouldn't have been able to return to Paris later in the '90s.

Peggy: Sure, they wouldn't have kind of almost allowed him in unless they knew his, you know, kind of heritage or whatever.

Annette: Exactly.

Peggy: So let's look at this one.

Now, this one, you said to me earlier that this was from the early '90s, and this is not couture; this is his ready-to-wear line.

Annette: Correct, so this is from 1991, and we know this is his ready-to-wear line because we have his Oscar de la Renta label here, which lets us know that this is from his brand based in New York.

We even have a "Made in USA" label.

Peggy: Oh, interesting.

Annette: So even as we're looking at this, though, we might remember that "ready-to-wear" is not a dirty word.

It doesn't mean that something is less important or elegant, and I think this is a really great example of elevated ready-to-wear.

Oscar de la Renta was really known for his artistic flair.

He loved illustration and drawing and had this really dramatic way of thinking about silhouettes and texture and surface design.

And that's really something he was accomplishing with this beautiful dress.

Peggy: So talk to me about just so-- because you can't feel them, but there's a velvet.

And most likely, it's probably a cotton velvet?

Annette: Yeah, I believe this is a cotton velvet, which really absorbs every bit of light that touches it.

And that's contrasted with this beautiful silk satin, which, because of the way the textile is woven, has these longer floats of satin thread, of silk thread, that illuminate light.

So, really, this provides some beautiful contrast and makes this really graphically impressive design for this piece because this collar and this placket at the center front stands in such stark contrast to the rest of the textile.

Peggy: It is just beautiful, and everything's so vertical that it really gives a long, lean look to the dress.

So when we talk about this dress being ready-to-wear, per se, how did it end up at the Texas Fashion Collection?

How did it end up in the collection?

Annette: So the Texas Fashion Collection is lucky to have pieces that show a lot of design integrity, and sometimes those are haute couture, sometimes they're ready-to-wear, sometimes they're made by home sewers, sometimes they're from the fashion industry.

Peggy: Sure, sure, you're not snobs.

Annette: Exactly, we just appreciate good design.

And these three pieces were gifted to us by Mercedes Bass, a really important collector of the fashion arts who has gifted many pieces to our collection to make them accessible to all of us for study.

Peggy: And not couture in this case, because her style, many times, was haute couture.

Annette: Correct.

So Mercedes Bass, I think, really gravitated towards Oscar de la Renta.

I think they share a really similar sensibility, especially because she dresses in a really elegant and feminine way, and those are qualities that many people ascribe to Oscar de la Renta.

Peggy: Sure, that's interesting.

Love that connection.

So let's talk about just how it's made and the components.

We know the fabrics.

They're just beautiful.

And you're right, that silk just-- I mean, the light just really changes in every direction as to what it does.

Let's talk about the closures.

He was really known for closures, yes?

Annette: So I think because he was so interested and invested in his artistic vision for what a garment would look like, all of the complexities that go into constructing that vision sometimes have to be hidden on the inside.

So we could imagine this piece if we had buttons going down the center front, it would disrupt that really graphic quality of this velvet.

So as we pull this back, you can see that this placket includes self-covered snaps, or covered snaps.

You can see that they're all covered in black fabric so that they sort of blend into the black velvet that they're grounded on.

You can also see that there's a hook-and-eye closure at the waistline to really anchor things.

And then even on the inside, you can see there's a Petersham belt or waist stay in a coordinated color.

So he's really thinking about the aesthetic experience someone would have stepping into this, getting to see the insides, but then also making sure when someone is dressed wearing this that the closures aren't a distraction.

The closures here are selected to really make sure that this aesthetic experience is maintained from his sketch and what's in his mind onto the garment that someone would get to wear.

Peggy: That right there is such-- gotta be such a talent, a learned talent.

To--how to almost assemble the dress from the vision.

That's just impressive.

So that inside little closure there hooks in.

It kind of holds things in place so that the outer layer doesn't pull.

Annette: Exactly, if someone were wearing a garment that is anchored at their natural waist, you kind of want that waistline to stay put.

So having this waist stay both makes it easier for someone to get dressed, sort of anchoring the garment around their bodies from the get-go, but then it also is a little bit closer to the body and keeps it anchored to the wearer.

Peggy: Sure, and then this part is not lined; and then the dress, the skirting is lined.

Annette: So we do have a lining here that almost exactly matches the fabric on the outside, and you can see it's been really carefully hand-stitched.

So, again, we think of ready-to-wear as being mass manufactured, but there are really levels to these things, and Oscar de la Renta was charging premium prices because he had this elevated vision and an elevated way that he executed it.

Peggy: So ballpark, would we even know what something like this cost on ready-to-wear?

And I know it's been 30 years.

Annette: I think in today's money something like this would be a few thousand dollars at least, knowing that it was made in America at a point when, you know, labor was really strong here and thinking through the really elevated materials and the expertise that it takes to execute something like this.

Peggy: It's just really beautiful.

I want to look inside because we don't see this a lot today.

The Petersham that's inside-- is that what it's called?

Is that correct?

Annette: So we have the Petersham belt here.

And we can see that it has been hand-stitched down.

So you can barely see those teeny tiny little stitches securing this grosgrain ribbon.

Peggy: They changed their thread, didn't they?

Annette: They did.

Peggy: Gosh, those unlazy people, I tell ya.

It's so easy to just use the same thread on your needle, but they took to every detail.

Annette: And that really is the difference between, I think, things executed with a lot of design economies, and then thinking through these really elevated pieces.

And luckily, when people are making clothing for themselves, they can make those decisions and they have far more control.

Peggy: And I wonder if somebody actually came along behind them and said, "No, no, no, change that thread."

You know, I wonder if they had to, or if they were such great sewers.

I mean, you think about all those little hands that were really constructing these garments.

Annette: Well, something that's really special about these elevated design spaces, either elevated ready-to-wear or haute couture, is that there are sort of generational investments in makers.

So while Oscar de la Renta's name is on this, he wasn't the one was was literally sitting down with a needle and thread, making every stitch.

It was really generations of makers who were in these workshops training each other, checking each other's work.

You have to invest in people with less skill to make sure by the time they're at the height of their career decades later, they've built up that knowledge.

Peggy: Sure, so on the bottom, what holds this dress out, what is this?

Annette: So it might be a little hard to see because it's fully encased in this taffeta, but you can maybe get the impression of this crinoline, which is a band of woven material that's really, really stiff.

And this is often added to hemlines just to give a little bit more body, especially as we can see that the skirt sort of flares at the bottom.

You need to make sure you have something with substance at the bottom to really hold that out.

Peggy: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

And so, and they--and it's not even in the exterior layer.

It's in the underneath, where it doesn't even really show.

It just does what it's supposed to do beautifully.

Annette: Exactly, so yeah, that is it a layer inside so that you don't have the stiff band creating an awkward line at the bottom of the skirt that people can see.

That's this layer on the inside, and you can even see here-- Peggy: This is interesting.

I wonder why they would do that.

They would--is that more like an underlining than a lining, isn't it?

Annette: It is.

It is.

Peggy: So the underlining is what it's all hemmed to so that it doesn't show on the outside.

Annette: Exactly.

Peggy: Oh, what a great trick.

Annette: And often with these really elevated ready-to-wear pieces, these were made with really generous seam allowances and hemlines so that you can adjust up and down depending on the wearer's height.

Peggy: That is just incredible.

I just love the details.

The details are just incredibly beautiful.

Annette: They really are.

Peggy: And again, the covered snaps, you know, we can do that.

Sometimes we think we have to have buttons.

We don't think of all these options, and I think that's what's fun to look at his stuff is to see all these options.

Let's look at the next one.

I just love this stuff.

Okay, this is profound.

This is--you know what I just love about this is it's beautiful and sophisticated, and yet it's got long sleeves.

So it's modest.

It's everything.

Annette: It has long sleeves.

This is made out of a really, really dense jersey knit.

So if you could imagine what a t-shirt feels like on your body, imagine just a denser, plusher version of that.

I think this is made out of cashmere even.

So you can imagine, we don't always think of evening dresses as being comfortable, but this certainly is even with how elevated the aesthetic is.

Peggy: And she had a little waist.

This is a little tiny waist.

We won't even go to what size, but that's a tiny waist.

Annette: Yeah, I think we can really appreciate the way that proportions are played with in this piece.

So you can see that there's a piece of fabric that drapes from the sleeve, and you can see this is actually a separate pattern piece than most of the bodice, and that sort of ruches in, and then you can see that there's gathering at the skirt, which is made of a different kind of fabric, and that adds a lot of volume.

Peggy: That's a lot of gathering.

Annette: It really is.

Peggy: Like, that's, do we know how big this hem is, probably around in inches?

Annette: I honestly don't know.

Peggy: This kind of looks like 3 to 1.

Annette: It very easily could be.

Peggy: And typically, ready-to-wear gathers are like 1.5 to 1, but that even looks more dense than 2.

That's big.

That's very pretty.

But the fabric-- and what is this fabric?

Annette: So this is silk satin as well, and you can really tell because of how much light is reflected by it.

And that, again, is really in contrast to this really dense wool that's just absorbing light.

Peggy: So this is a couture.

This was made for her, for Mrs.

Bass.

Annette: What's kind of incredible is this is also ready-to-wear from Oscar de la Renta.

It has a "Made in USA" label on the tag.

Peggy: They were friends.

I'll bet he called her and said, "Hey, I've got the dress for you."

Or maybe she called him.

Annette: It wouldn't surprise me.

This might even be a runway sample, to be honest.

Peggy: Yeah, it's beautiful.

And then he knew to tweak it to make it exactly purposeful for her.

So, but how do you get into a dress like this?

Annette: So it's really important thinking about design and lifestyle with this.

So, you know, maybe if we got this as a less expensive ready-to-wear piece, there might just be a side zipper, and we'd just pull this over our heads like a t-shirt.

Peggy: A zip up the side.

Annette: Exactly, but with this, because it's being worn by someone who's going to really elevated evening events, you can't just pull something over your hair and makeup.

So we have a lot of closures here, so this actually opens first with a hook-and-bar closure up at the top.

And then you can see that, in the side, we have a zipper that goes all the way down.

So a lot of the clothing that we have wouldn't necessarily have to open up at the neckline, but because this is an evening piece worn with all of these other lifestyle decisions, we need to have all of these really complicated closures.

And then as we're going in, you can also see that there's a snap here.

You can see that there's a hook and eye.

As we go further down, you'll see that the zipper extends past the waistline because, of course, the waistline is the narrowest part of this piece.

Someone needs to be able to get in here.

And then much like the last piece we looked at, you can see that there's a Petersham belt here.

And because this is on a mannequin, we can see how that functions-- that even though this garment is basically just being held up with the snap at the top, this Petersham belt, the waist stay, is anchoring this to the wearer's body.

So that really means when someone would zip this up, they're not putting all the pressure on the zipper.

Peggy: Sure, because that's what that Petersham is doing.

It's holding it together first.

So that's the first thing you do.

Then you zip it.

Annette: And then you have all these hook-and-eye and hook-and-bar closures.

So we have one, two, three, four, five sets of closures to get into this piece.

Peggy: So this is why he was known for closures.

Apparently, you have to have-- again, I'm gonna compare it to tools.

You have to have all those tools and know which ones to use, when to use them.

Annette: Exactly, and I think a lot of that is because Oscar de la Renta was both an innovative designer, but also had such an innovative way of thinking of silhouette and form that he would go to extreme lengths to make sure his vision was accomplished.

So if someone wanted to make this with more design economies, they could have something that looked similar but could not be at this really high level if they did not go to this fuss.

Peggy: Did he think about how someone was going to get in and out of them?

Annette: That's a good question, so I'm under the impression that a lot of very well-known fashion designers-- especially since Oscar had a background in painting and drawing, that he'd start with an illustration, and then that's often handed off to someone else who has a deeper expertise with draping or tailoring.

Peggy: The mechanical end of it.

Annette: Exactly, and then they'd often make a muslin that then the head designer would critique, maybe provide feedback, and likely help workshop how to make closures like this work.

Peggy: That makes a lot of sense.

Annette: It's really a conversation with a lot of people with a lot of expertise, but at the end of the day, the creative director is the one who's responsible for these pieces coming out the way that they do.

Peggy: And I guess there's really not a right and wrong.

If it works and it's mechanical and it goes together repeatedly the same way, that's really all that matters.

I guess some of us rely on directions, and we wanna be told, "Where's the zipper?

Where's this?

Where's that?"

rather than being the one who creates the answer.

We want just somebody to tell us.

So I love that.

Annette: There's merit in being told, especially when you're at the beginning of your creative learning.

But, I think, after a while, much like with cooking, you understand how ingredients come together and then develop your own expertise.

And you could even create something that maybe even an expert like Oscar de la Renta couldn't come up with.

Peggy: And then you don't wanna be told.

This is amazing.

I really--that's very, very cool.

And I love the cashmere and the silk together.

Cashmere knit and silk, you just don't see that a lot.

This is just stunningly beautiful.

Annette: Yeah, it's a gorgeous piece.

Peggy: All right, we've got another that I just-- I'm so excited because this is-- it's black, and yet it's not black.

This beautiful underpinnings, is it like a lavender, a peach?

Annette: So this is a really special piece, an example of haute couture from when Oscar de la Renta was the head of the House of Balmain.

And what we can see here is that we have layers and layers of netting or tulle, some of them black, and then we have this really beautiful light pink.

So the black is sort of tempering the brightness and the vibrance of the light pink, which I think makes this a more subtle and sophisticated design.

Peggy: I mean, it's just beautiful.

And you know, I love black always, but yet this isn't black, but yet it's black.

It's just a great marriage of the two.

But how do you get into this dress?

Because I've been staring at it thinking, okay, what are we gonna do here?

There's nothing in the back.

There's boning.

I can see boning.

I saw seven places where it's boned in the front, the side, the back, the center back, the side back, the side, and then of course over the bust-- always over the bust.

But then I didn't see any boning at center front so--but there has to be because, otherwise, it'll dip.

So tell me about how to get into this dress.

Or do I have to guess?

Annette: It is important that you can't tell how to get in.

That's the whole point of having these complex closures is to really almost maintain a fantasy of an illustration coming to life, not fussing with the practicalities of closures.

Peggy: Okay, that's interesting.

Annette: So since we're going to be doing this in reverse order, we're going to start here first with the side, and you'll see that, on this incredibly delicate netting, that we have snaps that have been stitched to this netting just to make sure this narrow slit has been secured.

Peggy: They're not covered.

They're just the same color as the netting.

Just a good old little black metal snap.

Annette: Exactly, exactly.

You could find these probably at any craft store.

Then as we go in further, you can see here that we have that underlayer of pink.

You can even see some of the hand-stitching to secure some of those layers of netting, and a zipper that's been hand-stitched in that's light pink and matches that fabric.

So those are really the details that set couture apart from a lot of ready-to-wear pieces.

Peggy: And I think, just-- I know it's Oscar, and I know it's haute couture, and yet at the same time, they're still matching everything.

The thread, the zipper, to the-- you know, everything's matched, and it's just pretty.

It does make me happy to look at it.

Annette: It's really beautiful, and it's something that I think, especially as people make clothing for themselves, you can take the time to source those things for yourself.

See, then we have a hook-and-eye closure at the side waist, and then we peel this open with snap after snap after snap.

So that's just on this quarter of the bodice because that's the kind of space someone would need to get into this, especially since the waistline is the narrowest part of the dress.

Peggy: So, what holds-- what stops these snaps?

There's a zipper and then a hook and eye at the end of the snap.

Okay, so the hook and eye is holding the weight.

Annette: Exactly, and then the most surprising part of this for me is that if we undo the front, that there is actually a zipper in the center front, which I'm guessing no one noticed.

Peggy: A separating zipper.

Annette: Yeah, and then you can see that the zipper goes down quite far, again, because it needs to be open enough for someone to get in and out of this.

You don't want to stop the zipper right at that waistline, because it won't be able to open far enough.

Peggy: Oh, so it's actually not a separating zipper.

It's just a long zipper.

Annette: Exactly, and it stops down at the bottom.

Peggy: Oh, that's interesting why they wouldn't do separating, maybe the bulk or something but... Annette: Yeah, maybe the bulk, maybe also so someone doesn't have to fiddle with getting it hooked back up.

Peggy: You're right.

That's pretty cool.

So that goes inside.

Annette: Exactly, and then you can see we even have a hook-and-eye closure at the very top to anchor the top and you can see here we have another Petersham belt.

This one has grosgrain ribbon on the inside, so on the inside, it looks exactly like the other pieces, but you can see that it's been covered with the same fabric as the lining here, which is really just a high level of finish.

And you can see a hook-and-bar closure right there too.

Peggy: Stable, strong and stable.

Annette: Very stable.

It's really like engineering went into this.

Peggy: It is, it's just incredible to see a zipper right at center front.

You'd think all these little buttons had to be undone.

They don't even have to be touched, but you don't even see that zipper.

Beautiful.

Annette: It's really maintaining a fantasy with this.

So as we looked at this piece altogether enclosed, really what we're focusing on is the texture of all of this netting and those really beautiful self-covered buttons.

So when someone's looking at this piece or when Oscar de la Renta illustrated this and first drew it, of course he's not thinking about having, you know, a zipper behind this.

He's thinking first about the aesthetic he wants to accomplish.

He's thinking about the texture of that ruched netting and the way the pink sort of glows out from behind that.

The zipper is what makes that work.

And how incredible that we get this literal inside look.

Peggy: Thank you, Mrs.

Bass.

You know, this is really-- it is beautiful.

Annette: We're so lucky.

Peggy: And I can't say thanks enough for this.

I mean, I just love it.

I love to see all these little hidden secrets that we'd never know.

We'd never know how to engineer this.

Even if we could design it and do all those, we'd never know how to do it.

So thank you.

Thank you for being here today.

I wanna take just a minute and I wanna look at some of these zippers and closures and buttons and just kind of have a short conversation about what they are and what to look for.

What we know about couture buttons is the glass buttons are always the most expensive.

And I've got some examples.

I'm gonna just put them on this different color so you can see the contrast of glass buttons.

Glass buttons are by far the most expensive type of buttons to get.

So when you are designing something and you feel like you really wanna take a level up and you have with everything else, be sure to include the buttons as well.

The next thing we go to is you see that we have the crystals and the pearls and you want to think about labor.

When you think about labor and how much time is put into them, you know that that's the cost of the buttons.

These are enamel.

We know that enamel is also--you know, you can see there's a couple steps necessary: the most, less, less.

And then you see buttons like this, and I see buttons like this in ready-to-wear all the time, and I see buttons like this on very expensive garments that are not terrible; they're just less expensive.

So you can decide at what level you want your buttons to be.

And then also when we talk about closures, this little invisible zipper is the best secret weapon you can do.

We've covered it many times.

You just stitch one side, stitch the other side, and then close up the bottom.

Don't try to close the bottom up first.

Don't try to do it with an invisible zipper foot, because you can't see what you're doing.

And then with a buttonhole, so many of the times, we can do a bound buttonhole, two little strips.

The back of the bound buttonhole is kind of where we are not sure what to do.

Typically just a buttonhole is stitched, and then they're put together.

The two can line up to where you have this beautiful bound buttonhole.

Bound buttonholes are used a lot.

Remember to use them on the bias.

We always want to start with a strip.

We fold it in half, we put the strips together, turn them to the other side.

So these closures are really fun, and just keep in mind: I think one thing we said is there's no rule book on which closures go together.

It really starts to be the engineering of it all.

Christian Dior's "Little Dictionary of Fashion" declared that black is appropriate at any time, for any age, and for almost any occasion.

Join me next time on "Fit 2 Stitch" as we celebrate that timeless elegance by looking at authentic Christian Dior garments that come together in black and beyond.

announcer: "Fit 2 Stitch" is made possible by Kai Scissors, Reliable Corporation, Bennos Buttons, Plano Sewing Center, Elliott Berman Textiles, and WAWAK Sewing Supplies.

To order a four-DVD set of "Fit 2 Stitch: Series 14," please visit our website at fit2stitch.com.