CINCINNATI — A new fashion exhibition is making its debut at the Cincinnati Art Museum this spring.
Elizabeth Hawes: Radical American Fashion explores the work of one woman who helped shape America’s identity in fashion design and personal expression. The exhibit opens on April 24 and features more than 50 garments made between the 1920s and 1960s; original sketches and illustrations; and the first publication devoted to Hawes’ career.
Hawes, who was born in 1903 and died in 1971, was a “radical designer, author and social commentator whose ideas were consistently far ahead of her time,” the museum said.
Cynthia Amnéus, Cincinnati Art Museum Curator of Fashion Arts and Textiles, curated the exhibit.
Hawes spent a brief time in Paris, but pushed for American fashion for American women, designed and produced on American soil which she spoke about in her first book, “Fashion is Spinach,” which was a critique of blind devotion to French fashion and the follies of the fashion industry.
”Though today not many people know her by name, we’re all familiar with conventions that Hawes introduced to our way of dressing,” said Megan Nauer, Acting Curator of Fashion Arts and Textiles. “When you read her sharp-tongued words, you recognize things we still wrestle with, both in dressing ourselves and in the functioning of the fashion industry.”
Hawes authored nine books on fashion and its role in society, stating that clothing was a direct expression of the self. She supported comfort, practicality and democratic access to well-made clothing.
She forecasted gender-neutral clothing, paper garments and mass-manufacturing methods well before they entered the mainstream in the 1960s.
Hawes closed her couture house in 1940 as America entered World War II. She then wrote for the left-leaning PM magazine, worked in an airplane engine factory during the war, and became a labor organizer for the United Auto Workers. Hawes was blacklisted by the FBI eventually because of her socio-political views.
Elizabeth Hawes: Radical American Fashion will open on April 24 and run through Aug. 2, 2026, in the Thomas R. Schiff Galleries (234 and 235), with free admission.
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