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Wedding dress

Design House Zandra Rhodes British
Designer Zandra Rhodes British
1977
Not on view
A textile designer by training, Rhodes developed an interest in fashion out of a desire to find the right vehicle for her distinctive, whimsical print designs. One of the reference points for her seminal 1977 “Conceptual Chic” collection was Elsa Schiaparelli’s famous “Tears” dress from 1938, an ensemble with a striking “torn” trompe l’oeil textile designed by the artist Salvador Dalí. Rhodes reversed her standard practice, rendering a two-dimensional print in three dimensions by making artfully placed and finished tears in a crystal-studded knit rayon. The collection offered a more refined take on the rips, chains, and safety pins that then adorned the punks of King’s Road in London. Rhodes, who has been credited as the first to integrate punk aesthetics into luxury fashion, admitted that she was responding to the zeitgeist, inspired by the “vibrations” in the air.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Wedding dress
  • Design House: Zandra Rhodes (British, founded 1969)
  • Designer: Zandra Rhodes (British, born 1940)
  • Date: 1977
  • Culture: British
  • Medium: Nylon, rayon, metal, glass
  • Credit Line: Gift of Zandra Rhodes, in honor of Harold Koda, 2016
  • Object Number: 2016.562a, b
  • Curatorial Department: The Costume Institute

More Artwork

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Coat, Zandra Rhodes British, wool, British
Coat
Zandra Rhodes
1968–69
Dress, Zandra Rhodes British, silk, leather, British
Dress
Zandra Rhodes
1973–79
Evening dress, Zandra Rhodes British, silk, plastic, synthetic, British
Evening dress
Zandra Rhodes
ca. 1983
Dress, Zandra Rhodes British, a) polyester, leather, glass, plastic; b) cotton, synthetic, nylon, British
Dress
Zandra Rhodes
ca. 1979
"Field of Lilies", Zandra Rhodes British, a) silk, plastic, synthetic fiber; b) synthetic fiber, British
"Field of Lilies"
Zandra Rhodes
1971

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