It consists of business records and correspondence, colored pencil sketches for Barney's Christmas windows done in 1988-1989, and approximately 500 color 35 mm slides illustrating window displays for Macy's, Bloomingdale's, Bergdorf Goodman, and Barney's.,This collection covers the full range of Cipriano's design career from 1983 to 1993.
The majority of the collection focuses on Cipriano's work for the Chelsea Passage for Barney's New York. Included is a copy of Barney's display policy providing details on when displays need to be checked, how often floral arrangements need to be changed, and other details. The collection also contains documentation for projects Cipriano did for Bride's magazine, Etoile, Ercole, Puiforcat, and Kosta Boda.
Biographical / Historical:
Window and display designer. Born Waterbury Connecticut, 1960. Cipriano studied fine art and art history at the University of Connecticut. His professional interests include costume, set, and theater design of the Art Deco, Art Moderne, and Art Nouveau styles. Prior to 1983, he did freelance displays for a number of small shops in Connecticut.
He began his professional career as a display trimmer for Macy's department store in New York in 1983. He designed for Bloomingdale's from 1984-85, and for Bergdorf Goodman's Home Department from 1985 to 1986. Cipriano became recognized shortly before his death in 1993, as an innovative designer of table settings for Barney's Chelsea Passage, where he served as Display Manager from 1985-1990.
Provenance:
This collection was donated in 1993 by D. Thomas Shoemaker.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
3 Boxes (2 letter sized boxes, 1 legal sized box.)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Clippings
Press releases
Speeches
Photographs
Date:
[mid-1940s-early 1960s]
Summary:
This collection spans the period from the mid-1940s to the early-1960s and consists ofnewspaper and magazine articles by and about Loewy, including the 1949 TIME magazine on which he appeared on the cover. Extensive clippings exist pertaining to his designs for automobiles. Also includes many articles and speeches written by and about William Snaith, a partner in the firm which was renamed Raymond Loewy/William Snaith, Inc. in 1961. A catalog from the exhibition, "Ten Automobiles," which took place at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 1953, is included. Other materials include brochures printed and designed by the firm, press releases, a listing of projects, honors, and membership. Some photographs of Loewy and his design team are included. The collection does not contain any original design materials or project files.
Arrangement note:
Unprocessed.
Biographical/Historical note:
Industrial Designer. Born Paris, France, November 8, 1893, Loewy initially studied electrical engineering, and by 1909, he has designed and sold a successful airplane model. He immigrated to the United States in 1919 and became a naturalized citizen in 1938. Loewy began working as a freelance window display designer for Macy's and Saks Fifth Avenue, and as an illustrator for Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and others, from 1919.
He designed the trademark for Neiman-Marcus in 1923. Loewy is identified as one of the founding fathers of industrial design. In 1929, he started Raymond Loewy Associates in New York, and by 1947, he appeared on the cover of TIME magazine. Loewy's designs always stressed the importance of the clean, functional, dynamic design of products. His schooling in electrical engineering translated into his designs for automobiles, trains, airplanes, ships, and spacecraft for NASA. He also designed interiors for many hotels, offices, and supermarkets. He is best known for his designs for the 1947 Studebaker Starlight Coupe; the 1953 Starliner Coupe; the 1961 Avanti; the 1947 line of Hallicrafter radio recievers; the 1929 Gestetner duplicating machine; the 1934 Sears Coldspot refrigerator; and the S-I steam locomotive for the Pennsylvania Railroad.
He also designed logos for Exxon and Shell oil companies, and bottles and refrigerated vending machines for Coca Cola. He became President of the American Society of Industrial Designers in 1946. Loewy established Compagnie de l'Esthetique Industrielle in Paris in 1952. His work has been featured in many exhibitions, including: "An Exhibition for Modern Living", Detroit Institute of Arts, 1949; "The Designs of Raymond Loewy", Renwick Gallery of the National Collection of Fine Arts, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., 1975; and "The Machine Age in America", Brooklyn Museum, 1986, among others. He authored, "The Locomotive: Its Esthetics", 1937; "Never Leave Well Enough Alone", 1951; and "Industrial Design", 1979. In 1961, Loewy went into semi-retirement, became partners with William Snaith, and renamed the company Raymond Loewy/William Snaith, Inc. Loewy died in Monte Carlo, July 14, 1986.
Location of Other Archival Materials Note:
Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. The Raymond Loewy Collection. Drawings, blueprints, sketches, phtographs, slides, and audio and video recordings, covering the period from 1929-1988.
Canadian Center for Architecture, Special Collections. Vertical file docmenting Loewy's work.
Provenance:
The materials in this collection were donated to Cooper-Hewitt by Betty Reese, Loewy's publicist.
Restrictions:
Unprocessed; access is limited. Permission of Library Director required for use.
Collected display window photographs assembled by Gene Moore, artistic director of Tiffany & Company from 1955 to 1995, documenting window displays at Tiffany & Company's flagship store in New York City, New York.
Scope and Contents:
This collection of photographs originally consisted of 78 notebooks containing approximately 50 8" x 10" photographs each.This photographic record was compiled by Tiffany & Company artistic director Gene Moore. These photographs document window displays of Tiffany & Company, 5th Avenue, New York City, New York during Moore's tenure as artistic director from 1955-1994. Nearly all of the imaginative and inventive window displays created by Moore and other designers during his almost 40-year association with Tiffany's are documented in these photographs. Many of the photographs are dated in the lower right corner and in some instances divided by designer. The "Original Archive Box" notation that appeared on the spine of each notebook has been copied in the container listing under each entry. These entries include the names within the notebooks. While the majority of the photographs are in black and white, there are a few color images for later window treatments. Photographers credited on the reverse of some of the photographs are Virginia Roehl, Nick Malon, Malon Studios Incorporated, and Fifth Avenue Display Photographers. The collection does not include any supporting documentation for these photographs. None of Moore's displays for other clients is included.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged in one series.
Series 1, Display Window Photographs, 1955-1995.
Biographical / Historical:
Gene Moore was born in Birmingham, Alabama on June 10, 1910. Although Moore studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Chicago, he was mainly self-taught in design. His first display job was with I. Miller in New York from 1936-1938. Moore became a display assistant at Bergdorf Goodman (Delman Shoe division) in New York in 1938. Moore then became display manager at Bonwit Teller in New York City in 1945, where he frequently collaborated with well-known artists of the Pop Art movement including Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, and Robert Rauschenberg.
During this time, the profession of window display was gaining acceptance with the work of Moore and his contemporaries Henry F. Callahan at Lord & Taylor, Sidney Ring at Saks Fifth Avenue, and John R. Foley at Macy's, among others.
Moore joined Tiffany & Company in 1955 and is best known for his highly acclaimed work as Display Manager, Artistic Director, and Vice President. Walter Hoving, Chairman of the Board of Tiffany, charged Moore with the following mission: "I want you to make our windows as beautiful as you can according to your own taste ... Above all, don't try to sell anything; we'll take care of that in the store." There he created innovative, imaginative window displays for almost 40 years, from 1955 to 1994. His designs were famous for combining and juxtaposing common, everyday objects with exquisite pieces of fine jewelry.
Moore selected each object to echo the shapes, forms, and textures of the others. In addition, he designed jewelry and silver objects for Tiffany, most notably, his 1988 "Tiffany Circus" which featured 28 miniature circus animals and performers. Moore also worked as a freelance designer, starting in 1955, for Clarence House, Seagram Building, Delmar Shoe Salon, Madison Avenue Bookstore, American Museum of Natural History, Museum of Modern Art, Castelli Gallery, and Paul Taylor Dance Company, among others. In addition, he is credited with the design of the lobby of Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center in New York City. His autobiography, My Time at Tiffany's, was written with Jay Hyams and published in 1990. His work was the subject of the 1996-1997 exhibition, "Moon Over Pearls, Gene Moore's Tiffany Windows and Beyond"; held at The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City.
"Gene Moore, 88, Window Display Artist, Dies"; The New York Times, November 26, 1998, page C17.
Related Materials:
Additional material on Gene Moore's work for Tiffany & Company may be found at the Tiffany & Company Archive in Parsippany, New Jersey.
Provenance:
These photographs were donated to the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution by Gene Moore in 1997.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Photographs -- Black-and-white photoprints -- 20th century
Citation:
Gene Moore, Tiffany & Company Photographs, 1955-1995, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Collection processing and image scanning funded by donors William Rondina and Daniel Gelman (President and CEO of Lighting Services Inc), with perseverance from Gene Moore's protégé Thomas Beebe.
