Mary McFadden (October 1, 1938 – September 13, 2024) was an American art collector, editor, fashion designer, and writer. She designed pleated dresses which were popular with women in high society.

Early life and education

McFadden was born on October 1, 1938, in Manhattan, New York, and spent the early part of her childhood on a cotton plantation outside Memphis, Tennessee. When she was nine, her father died in an avalanche while he was skiing in Aspen, Colorado. Afterwards, the family moved to Westbury, New York, and she was sent to the Foxcroft School from which she graduated. She went on to attend Columbia University, the Ecole Lubec, the New School for Social Research, the Sorbonne, and the Traphagen School of Fashion (1956, Costume Design).

Career

Between 1962 and 1964, McFadden worked as public relations director at Christian Dior in New York and Paris. Since she knew nothing about publicity, she made an agreement that she would be paid in the form of 50 dresses per year from Dior-New York and Dior-Paris instead of money. She then married Philip Harari, a merchant for De Beers. She relocated to South Africa in the same year and Diana Vreeland arranged for her to become an editor for Vogue South Africa, she was in the position until 1966 when the magazine was closed. She then worked for The Rand Daily Mail as a travel and political columnist. She was also a freelance editor for Vogue Paris between 1968 and 1970. In 1976, McFadden began the clothing company Mary McFadden Inc. The company was noted for the McFadden-designed pleated dresses, which draped "like liquid gold" down a woman's body similar to those on the caryatids at the Acropolis. The dresses were similar to the earlier work of Henriette Negrin and Mariano Fortuny. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute curator Harold Koda deemed her a "design archaeologist" for her historically inspired work. The dresses were made from Marii, a synthetic charmeuse patented by McFadden in 1975 that was made in Australia, dyed in Japan, and then machine-pressed in the United States. The dresses were popular with socialites including Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. The company closed in 2002. From 1982 to 1983, McFadden was the first female President of the Council of Fashion Designers of America. In 2012, McFadden and her companion Murray Gell-Mann published the book Mary McFadden: A Lifetime of Design, Collecting, and Adventure. McFadden also licensed her name to many products such as eyewear, footwear, home furnishings, and sleepwear. In 2024, Drexel University staged an exhibition of McFadden's fashion creations titled Modern Ritual: The Art of Mary McFadden.

Personal life

McFadden claimed to be married at least eleven times, but declared that some of these marriages were "only spiritual". McFadden is known to have been married to, in chronological order: McFadden had a daughter, Justine Harari, from her marriage to Philip Harari. Mary McFadden died from myelodysplasia at her home in Southampton, New York, on September 13, 2024, at the age of 85.

Awards