When Edith Wharton first found herself in the presence of the great Henry James, who was to become one of her closest friends, she was a young married woman of 25 and as yet unpublished.

She was a guest at a dinner party in Paris in 1887, to which both had been invited.

Little else is actually known about that particular evening, although it seems that Wharton

felt too shy to speak to the literary master, and so their first meaningful connection would

not come until years later.

What we do know something about, however, is the dress that Wharton wore for this anticipated auspicious

meeting. It was a new gown made specifically for her by the Parisian House of Ducet on the

Rue de la Pais, one of the many great fashion houses concentrated on the city's right bank.

Wharton describes the gown as a tea rose pink with iridescent beads, and notes with pride that it was made by Jusay.

American women of a certain level of society in the Gilded Age could tell you all about the dresses and gowns they wore,

how they were made, which house created them, and less often, they

admitted just how much they had actually paid for them.

The intricate world of the Parisian Couture houses that created these costumes for the real

Gilded Age, not a fictional filmed version, was far more tightly woven and interdependent

than one might think at first glance.

This was a world that combined the vision of both designers as well as the moneyed patrons

and included an influential commercial network far beyond just the design house

whose extravagant creations went on full display at the opera and at the grand balls.

This show delves far below the surface to understand this world,

and with the extraordinary research and insight of my guest today,

we are able to understand just how it all worked.

Just what was it like to have clothes custom designed by a great partition designer?

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