Photos By Gail

African American designer Ann Lowe (1898 – 1981) learned to sew from her dressmaker mother, Janie Cole, and her grandmother, Georgia Thompkins. One of her earliest pleasures was crafting fabric flowers, a skill that became one of the defining characteristics of her beautifully constructed occasion gowns for debutante and brides. This Evening Dress designed by Lowe for A. F Chantilly (1968)  presents a terrific example of this skill.

Lowe first established herself in Montgomery, Alabama then moved to Tampa, Florida, where she was a seamstress for a wealthy family before branching out, and finally landing in New York City, where she was a freelance designer and business owner.

Working as a black woman designer doing a period of racial segregation in the United States, presented a variety of obstacles throughout her lifetime. Lowe’s exclusion from fashion history has inspired others to re-examine her 50+-plus year career, which notable includes her uncredited design of Jacqueline, Kennedy’s 1953 wedding gown.

Photographed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art as part of the Exhibit, Women Dressing Women.