Iris Apfel, Eye-Catcher With a Kaleidoscopic Wardrobe, Dies at 102
March 3, 2024 2:34 PM Subscribe
Iris Apfel, a New York society matron and interior designer who late in life knocked the socks off the straight fashion world with a brash bohemian style that mixed hippie vintage and haute couture, found treasures in flea markets and reveled in contradictions, died on Friday in her home in Palm Beach, Fla. She was 102. [New York Times; ungated]
Iris Apfel Dies at 102 [WWD]
Iris Apfel: US fashion designer dies aged 102 [BBC]
Iris Apfel: designer, model and fashion star – a life in pictures and Iris Apfel: joyful iconoclast who broke all the rules with incredible taste [Grauniad]
Iris Apfel Dies at 102 [WWD]
Iris Apfel: US fashion designer dies aged 102 [BBC]
Iris Apfel: designer, model and fashion star – a life in pictures and Iris Apfel: joyful iconoclast who broke all the rules with incredible taste [Grauniad]
Thank you for including alternate links. I can't with good conscience give the NYT traffic.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 2:48 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 2:48 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
.
posted by LindsayIrene at 3:39 PM on March 3
posted by LindsayIrene at 3:39 PM on March 3
.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 3:40 PM on March 3
posted by gentlyepigrams at 3:40 PM on March 3
The clothes weren't to my taste, but I did love her oversized jewelry and beads.
posted by Czjewel at 3:43 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
posted by Czjewel at 3:43 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
.
posted by JoeXIII007 at 4:17 PM on March 3
posted by JoeXIII007 at 4:17 PM on March 3
👓
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:29 PM on March 3
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:29 PM on March 3
.
posted by hydrobatidae at 5:35 PM on March 3
posted by hydrobatidae at 5:35 PM on March 3
For the New England MeFites, the Peabody Essex Museum has some of her clothing on display.
posted by pxe2000 at 5:45 PM on March 3 [4 favorites]
posted by pxe2000 at 5:45 PM on March 3 [4 favorites]
.
posted by The Ardship of Cambry at 6:03 PM on March 3
posted by The Ardship of Cambry at 6:03 PM on March 3
.
Love her, what a shining light - watch the documentary about her, it's great. She reminds me a lot of my grandmother, who was very stylish, creative and funny, but also a narcissist that was a bit of a nightmare to have a personal relationship with. I would always look at Iris, thinking, this is what my Omi could have been like, if only kindness was important to her.
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 6:06 PM on March 3 [5 favorites]
Love her, what a shining light - watch the documentary about her, it's great. She reminds me a lot of my grandmother, who was very stylish, creative and funny, but also a narcissist that was a bit of a nightmare to have a personal relationship with. I would always look at Iris, thinking, this is what my Omi could have been like, if only kindness was important to her.
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 6:06 PM on March 3 [5 favorites]
oo
posted by lapolla at 6:09 PM on March 3 [3 favorites]
posted by lapolla at 6:09 PM on March 3 [3 favorites]
.
posted by EvaDestruction at 7:10 PM on March 3
posted by EvaDestruction at 7:10 PM on March 3
"Two weeks ago my 7yo niece was to dress as a 100 year old person for their 100th Day of School..."
posted by gwint at 7:28 PM on March 3 [6 favorites]
posted by gwint at 7:28 PM on March 3 [6 favorites]
Apfel said she was a "geriatric starlet;" the Met's Rara Avis: Selections from the Iris Barrel Apfel Collection opened on September 13, 2005, "exploring the affinity between fashion and accessory designs and examining the power of dress and accessories to assert style above fashion, the individual above the collective." From a 2015 Guardian interview:
A late summer exhibition at the Met had been cancelled and [curator Harold] Koda, looking for a last- minute replacement, had been suddenly struck by inspiration. Having heard that Apfel had one of the best wardrobes of costume jewellery in the United States, he called her up and asked her to create a show from her personal collection of vintage and designer accessories and clothes. What resulted was Rara Avis: Selections from the Iris Apfel Collection, an exhibition that was unlike any other for two reasons: it was the only show of its kind at the Met that had focused on a living female who wasn’t a designer, and secondly, it was styled by Apfel, who dressed the mannequins according to the irreverent ways she wore the garments. The response was unprecedented. “I don’t know if there’s been any other show that’s relied so much on word-of-mouth,” Koda recalls. People loved Apfel’s wacky combinations, and virtually overnight a new fashion star was born.
Old World Weavers, the textile company Apfel co-founded with her husband, Carl, in 1950, was very successful; clients included the White House under nine presidents, the State Department, Estee Lauder, Greta Garbo and Faye Dunaway.
Iris Apfel, the lovable 96-year-old fashion icon, is officially the oldest person to ever be turned into a Barbie doll (2018); an Apfel-styled Barbie in a brocade pantsuit. “My first big job in beauty and fashion came when I was at the tender age of ninety,” she writes in her 2018 book, “Iris Apfel: Accidental Icon.” “I’m the oldest living broad that ever graced a major cosmetics campaign,” continues Apfel, who developed a limited edition collection of make-up for MAC cosmetics for the winter of 2011. [IRIS for MAC was a 21-piece collection, with names inspired by birds.]
Apfel began a teaching career a dozen years ago; the professor with her UT Austin students in 2022. Footwear News covergirl, 2017 & 2022.
posted by Iris Gambol at 8:56 PM on March 3 [6 favorites]
A late summer exhibition at the Met had been cancelled and [curator Harold] Koda, looking for a last- minute replacement, had been suddenly struck by inspiration. Having heard that Apfel had one of the best wardrobes of costume jewellery in the United States, he called her up and asked her to create a show from her personal collection of vintage and designer accessories and clothes. What resulted was Rara Avis: Selections from the Iris Apfel Collection, an exhibition that was unlike any other for two reasons: it was the only show of its kind at the Met that had focused on a living female who wasn’t a designer, and secondly, it was styled by Apfel, who dressed the mannequins according to the irreverent ways she wore the garments. The response was unprecedented. “I don’t know if there’s been any other show that’s relied so much on word-of-mouth,” Koda recalls. People loved Apfel’s wacky combinations, and virtually overnight a new fashion star was born.
Old World Weavers, the textile company Apfel co-founded with her husband, Carl, in 1950, was very successful; clients included the White House under nine presidents, the State Department, Estee Lauder, Greta Garbo and Faye Dunaway.
Iris Apfel, the lovable 96-year-old fashion icon, is officially the oldest person to ever be turned into a Barbie doll (2018); an Apfel-styled Barbie in a brocade pantsuit. “My first big job in beauty and fashion came when I was at the tender age of ninety,” she writes in her 2018 book, “Iris Apfel: Accidental Icon.” “I’m the oldest living broad that ever graced a major cosmetics campaign,” continues Apfel, who developed a limited edition collection of make-up for MAC cosmetics for the winter of 2011. [IRIS for MAC was a 21-piece collection, with names inspired by birds.]
Apfel began a teaching career a dozen years ago; the professor with her UT Austin students in 2022. Footwear News covergirl, 2017 & 2022.
posted by Iris Gambol at 8:56 PM on March 3 [6 favorites]
.
posted by trip and a half at 4:20 AM on March 4
posted by trip and a half at 4:20 AM on March 4
.
posted by carrioncomfort at 4:55 AM on March 4
posted by carrioncomfort at 4:55 AM on March 4
.
posted by warriorqueen at 6:25 AM on March 4
posted by warriorqueen at 6:25 AM on March 4
on Apfel's happy, 67-year marriage (in 2015, her husband Carl passed away at age 100):
The style icon met her husband in 1947, while they both were vacationing in Lake George, New York. In an interview with Palm Beach Illustrated, Iris shared that it was the first vacation she took that she paid for herself, using her earnings from her job as a copy editor at Women's Wear Daily. She also shared that they were both there with other people, so they didn't get together on the trip.
About a month after they first met in Lake George, Iris went out with "an old beau" in New York City. On the way home, they stopped briefly outside of Bonwit Teller to look at the window displays. When Iris arrived home that evening, her phone rang — it was Carl.
"And he told me he loved the hat I was wearing today, and that I had on a smashing suit," she recalled to Palm Beach Illustrated. "He had been on a bus that broke down in front of Bonwit Teller, and as he was waiting there for someone to come and fix it, he was looking at me." Iris and Carl then decided to go on a date. They had their first date on Columbus Day, which fell on Oct. 11 that year. Iris was 26 at the time, and Carl was 33 years old.
A little more than a month after their first date, Carl proposed to Iris on Thanksgiving Day, though she didn't get a ring until Christmas of that year. In a documentary about Iris' life and career, aptly called Iris, it's clear that the couple were attracted to each other from the start — and shared a dry sense of humor.
"There was something about her that just got into me," Carl said in the documentary, per the New York Times. "It's always there." Iris gave him a pat on the hand and said, "And I figured he was cool and he was cuddly, and he cooked Chinese, so I couldn't do any better."
[The two married on February 22, 1948.]
posted by Iris Gambol at 7:19 AM on March 4 [5 favorites]
The style icon met her husband in 1947, while they both were vacationing in Lake George, New York. In an interview with Palm Beach Illustrated, Iris shared that it was the first vacation she took that she paid for herself, using her earnings from her job as a copy editor at Women's Wear Daily. She also shared that they were both there with other people, so they didn't get together on the trip.
About a month after they first met in Lake George, Iris went out with "an old beau" in New York City. On the way home, they stopped briefly outside of Bonwit Teller to look at the window displays. When Iris arrived home that evening, her phone rang — it was Carl.
"And he told me he loved the hat I was wearing today, and that I had on a smashing suit," she recalled to Palm Beach Illustrated. "He had been on a bus that broke down in front of Bonwit Teller, and as he was waiting there for someone to come and fix it, he was looking at me." Iris and Carl then decided to go on a date. They had their first date on Columbus Day, which fell on Oct. 11 that year. Iris was 26 at the time, and Carl was 33 years old.
A little more than a month after their first date, Carl proposed to Iris on Thanksgiving Day, though she didn't get a ring until Christmas of that year. In a documentary about Iris' life and career, aptly called Iris, it's clear that the couple were attracted to each other from the start — and shared a dry sense of humor.
"There was something about her that just got into me," Carl said in the documentary, per the New York Times. "It's always there." Iris gave him a pat on the hand and said, "And I figured he was cool and he was cuddly, and he cooked Chinese, so I couldn't do any better."
[The two married on February 22, 1948.]
posted by Iris Gambol at 7:19 AM on March 4 [5 favorites]
I love that a man actually noticed and admired her outfit!
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:09 AM on March 4 [1 favorite]
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:09 AM on March 4 [1 favorite]
.
I loved her style. Not so much her politics.
(apologies if this is going against community standards re: obit posts - I can't remember if a consensus was ever reached)
posted by queensissy at 4:29 PM on March 4 [2 favorites]
I loved her style. Not so much her politics.
(apologies if this is going against community standards re: obit posts - I can't remember if a consensus was ever reached)
posted by queensissy at 4:29 PM on March 4 [2 favorites]
Someone born rich who supports the far right and is famous for making tacky outfits? I don't see anything worth celebrating.
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:11 AM on March 5 [1 favorite]
posted by The Manwich Horror at 6:11 AM on March 5 [1 favorite]
Someone born rich who supports the far right and is famous for making tacky outfits? I don't see anything worth celebrating.I knew nothing about her politics when I first saw her archive, and in 2010 I had no real interest in going further. Her eye was enough for me. I didn't know she was a right winger until after her death. As much as I would have strongly disagreed with her political views, her archives are invaluable to textile history, and she's not going to make money off of her donations to and exhibits in museums now.
That said, thinking about her politics while watching Maylses' documentary was disappointing. So many of her peers and students were Black and gay, and they suffered as a result of 45's administration. It's too bad she couldn't see the effects he had on her community.
posted by pxe2000 at 10:29 AM on March 5 [3 favorites]
It is disappointing. In this 2010 interview (at The Guardian; archive link) Apfel "is socially liberal, she explains, but fiscally conservative"; she was 8 years old at the start of the Great Depression, and 20 when WWII ended it.
2020: Apfel and her ladybug jewelry get out the vote.
posted by Iris Gambol at 11:01 AM on March 5 [1 favorite]
2020: Apfel and her ladybug jewelry get out the vote.
posted by Iris Gambol at 11:01 AM on March 5 [1 favorite]
« Older Karen Carpenter, the Drummer Who Sang | Radley Balko goes long against a George Floyd... Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by Kattullus at 2:41 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]