FIT’s newest exhibition Pink: The History of a Punk, Pretty, Powerful Color, looks at 300 years of Pink in fashion. About 80 ensembles are divided into two sections with the first area addressing the “Pretty in Pink” phenomena with 35 classic examples.
To highlight the feminization of the color, an 1857 bright pink crinoline dress is displayed opposite from a black 1860s men’s suit. Although the Twenties ushered in the Little Black Dress, that period also saw greater interest for a range of pinks. In the late Thirties, Elsa Schiaparelli amped up the color with her signature Shocking Pink. By the Fifties, the pink-for-girls, blue-for-boys dictum was entrenched in society. As a sign of the more genderless color palettes that lay ahead, Brooks Brothers offered a pink shirt for men at the time.
A 1937 Charles James dress with an abundance of pink rose motifs on the bodice, a 1960 bulbous Christian Dior dress and a 1978 Zandra Rhodes ensemble with cutouts will be among the pieces on view. The exhibition also examines how pink has been adopted by non Western countries such as India, where men and women have worn the color for years.
Pink’s role in political protests and popular music is also addressed in the second gallery. There, examples by Gucci, Comme des Garçons’ Rei Kawakubo, Valentino and others are on view.
