Guest Author - Norma Shephard

“Collectible Fashions of the Turbulent 1930s” was written for designers, costumers, and vintage costume collectors, and as such, it contains a number of features — price guide, glossary, bibliography, index, photographs, and illustrations — which enable readers to easily date, identify, and evaluate items they may have in their own possession, and to recreate realistic costume pieces from the period.

Author, Ellie Laubner, explains in her preface that this book is an attempt to “keep dealers and collectors well informed”, provide a “valuable resource for period costumers”, and become a “source of inspiration for contemporary fashion designers.” To this end, she has supplemented the text with hundreds of color photographs, a number of period advertisements, and some carefully selected fashion illustrations. I was able to find a number of items that correlate precisely to artifacts in my own museum collection.

This hard cover, 238-page book is divided into chapters covering various fashion elements including lingerie, day wear, evening attire, bridal gowns, sportswear, outer garments, hair and headgear, handbags, vanities and compacts, footwear, jewelry, men’s wear, uniforms, and clothing for children. A section on miscellaneous accessories features stunning color photographs of lorgnettes and eyeglasses, belts, buckles, buttons, and manicure sets.

I am particularly fond of hats, and although I have access to over 2500 vintage chapeaux from the Mobile Millinery Museum, and have written and photographed my own book on the subject (1,000 Hats), I found one or two charmers in this publication that has me wanting to scour the flea markets for more. Likewise, after reading the chapter on day wear I am tempted to pull a few 1930s treasures out of my own archives and look at them with fresh eyes. My favorite segment in the book however is the one devoted to jewelry. Dress clips, double-clip brooches, pins, necklaces, rings and watches unique to the period, are effectively showcased.

The serious student of fashion may wish to begin this book with a perusal of the glossary as it is most helpful in defining terms unique to the costume industry and goes so far as to provide phonetic pronunciations for a number of French words found throughout the book. But, whether you read ‘Collectible Fashions of the Turbulent 1930s” from cover to cover or skip through the pages looking for elements of particular interest, you will be captivated by the striking images that are enriched by Laubner’s informative text. This is definitely a book for the costume designer’s and/or vintage fashion enthusiast’s library.