Evening cape

Elsa Schiaparelli

winter 1937 · silk · Costume Institute

"Harper's Bazaar" featured a fashion illustration in its October 1937 issue of this cape being worn by a woman who resembles the owner of this cape, Millicent Rogers. Described as "all black as deep night," this dramatic cape is decorated with moiré grosgrain bows, perched on the shoulders like birds. Particularly in her collections of the 1930s, shoulders were often accentuated. The embroidered wheat ear motif on the collar is symbolically associated with blessing, harvest and life itself, as wheat is a fruit of the Earth. The overall silhouette is impressive and like many of Schiaparelli's designs, required a requisite amount of fashion bravado to wear it.

Artist

Elsa Schiaparelli

Date

winter 1937

Medium

silk

Culture

French

Department

Costume Institute

Credit line

Brooklyn Museum Costume Collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of the Brooklyn Museum, 2009; Gift of Arturo and Paul Peralta-Ramos, 1954