Dorothy Draper (1889-1969) was the first to “professionalize” the interior design industry by establishing, in 1923, the first interior design company in the United States, Dorothy Draper & Company. At the time, it was considered daring for a woman to go into business for herself. She revolutionized the concept of “design” by breaking away from the historical “period room” styles that dominated the times. She used vibrant, “splashy” colors in never-before-seen combinations.
In the Pink, Dorothy Draper, America's Most Fabulous Decorator recalls America's most celebrated decorator-weaving together words, memorabilia, and over three hundred photographs- many never before published. In the Pink captures Dorothy Draper's iconic style, indomitable spirit, and original inventive designs which have become an enduring legend.
Thanks to her creative genius, originality as a stylist and her daring as a businesswoman, Mrs. Draper became one of the most respected career women in the United States. Beloved by business titans to readers of her editorial column in Good Housekeeping, where she provided middle-class housewives with affordable ideas for making their homes more functional and comfortable. She shocked the design world in 1937 when she decorated the thirty-seven-story Hampshire House apartment hotel on Central Park South in New York City, delivering a project that became indicative of her signature touch - 'baroque fantasy'. In this book Carleton Varney lavishly illustrates for the first time Draper’s most important projects. From the Greenbrier resort in West Virginia to the Quitandinha in Brazil to her fabric and wallpaper collections, to automobile and airplane interiors.
