Evening Dress

Trained as an architect, Charles James was credited with raising fashion from an applied art to a pure art form. Cristóbal Balenciaga called James “the world’s best and only dressmaker,” and Christian Dior credited him with inspiring his revolutionary “New Look” collection. James's work was classic couture, but his approach to design was radical. Unlike most other designers, James was not confined by fashion trends. Rather than changing his concepts every six months, he worked and reworked a single design for decades.

James created master patterns that served as design modules. Interchangeable parts for each section of the garment could be combined to produce thousands of variations. James is best known for his highly structured and engineered ball gowns, which he created with mathematical precision. These grand gowns are sculptures that fit the wearer closely but maintain their three-dimensional form when removed from the body.

This architectural masterpiece, titled "Lampshade," was one of only a thousand designs that James completed during his forty-year career. Although he was a master colorist, James used black and white to realize his purest design concepts. Both sections of the dress—the elongated bodice of black silk velvet, the skirt of white silk faille—are supported by rigid substructures.

Wearable art: Charles James considered his garments to be works of art. Salvador Dalí referred to James's pieces as "soft sculptures."