Dressing gown as formal wear
Linda of California
The other night my husband and I went to the Creative Arts Emmys, which is not the big televised thing with directors and series actors, but a recognition of the thousands of professionals in television who work in things like picture editing, cinematography, hair, makeup, costumes, sound editing, etc with also some fun guest actors so it’s not 100% A/V nerds and we get a little celebrity proximity. As I mentioned last time, it’s also a big opportunity to get dressed up real fancy, which I normally don’t have an opportunity to do, so as a perfectionist, it felt important to get it right. Even if an Emmy award wasn’t in the cards for him, I guess I wanted to win at having a great outfit?
(Sidenote, there were SO MANY great looks that I wanted to take pics of but was too shy to ask permission. If I had known that most people would be on the formal/creative side of the spectrum and not the casual side I probably would have put even more unnecessary pressure on myself so I’m glad I did not know!)
As I mentioned last time, I chose a 1940s dressing gown by Linda, a local company founded here in Los Angeles in 1914.
The Linda Co. was named for Linda Klamroth, daughter of Ethel Klamroth. Ethel was born in Sussex and came to the United States as a teenager around 1895, married her husband Henry at 20, and became a widow at just 32. Like so many of the stories I write about, Ethel found herself with three young children to support: Gertrude, age 11, and twins Hilda and Linda, age 7. Henry was a Pasadena judge who died unexpectedly from a lung hemorrhage, just after “he had heard a civil case and then gone out and bought a new suit of clothes.” He was 41 years old. He left Ethel with a modest house1 on South Euclid Avenue and about $1700 in securities, roughly $55,000 today.
In a 1935 LA Times article, Ethel had already been in business for over 20 years and so was described as the “dean” of this group of designers,
“since her business was started in 1914, with three employees, and faith and hope for capital. Left a widow with three small girls, Mrs. Klamroth had no business experience to go upon. But she was a gritty Englishwoman, and she could sew. A tiny dressmaking business just grew into a factory, because somehow retailers found her out. Now she does a flourishing local and national trade, under the title of The Linda Company, designs negligees, lounge robes, pajamas, bed jackets, etc., hires forty-two people, and is the youngest, gayest grandmamma you ever met.”
Linda is a common name so this piece was pretty tough to research, but it seems like Ethel ran the business with eldest daughter Gertrude for a number of years, and died in 1965. Linda Co. went on until the early 1970s. These examples from California Stylist in the late 1940s show their approach to pajamas and loungewear, often using new or interesting fabrics and California-specific designs:
Mine is right around this time, probably 1946-ish. I added giant shoulder pads to help with my short torso problem, and somehow managed to turn my 70s shag into a totally passable 40s wave? The short layers helped the curl hold all night and even though it looks messy in the end-of-night photo on the right I couldn’t believe it kept its shape without any product.
For accessories, I wore this silver chain bib necklace I got from my favorite stylist and fashion icon Erik, my coral diamond ring from Cassidy Vintage, this incredible cocktail ring from Wildfell Hall and my beaded bag from Playclothes, where the dress is also from.
This whole experience — from the difficult shopping to the end of the night, when someone I didn’t know went out of their way to compliment my look — has helped me tease out some feelings around getting dressed. The absolute highlight of the evening for me was walking past a group of costume designers who looked incredible in things they had clearly made themselves, and connecting over a moment of mutual adoration for style/color/creativity. Even though I design emails and style photos instead of designing the clothes themselves, professional recognition from other creatives is the most satisfying thing, and to me it feels like my personal style is the quickest read in public for how competent I am as a professional. My panic over how to dress a larger body has just as much (if not more) to do with my faith in my own talent as it does with getting older, bigger, etc. If I can’t dress well, how will people know they can trust me to put together something beautiful on a screen or paper? I’m not saying this is entirely logical or justified — I know plenty of talented designers who don’t really give a shit what they wear — but it feels true for me, and that moment of tiny applause from this particular group of talented women was exactly what I needed.
The house is no longer there, but the extant houses on South Euclid that were built in the 1910s are craftsman bungalows, much smaller than some of the grand homes built for wealthy east-coasters in Pasadena at the time, so I’m making a bit of an assumption.
I was also at the Creative Arts Emmys with my nominated husband. I work in costumes and felt immense pressure. I am also in a bigger body than I’m used to and I’m still learning how to dress it; I basically had to give up on wearing vintage after my kid was born. It has been the hardest thing about motherhood—I basically dress vicariously through my kid, who has some great vintage pieces. I really felt this and your last piece. Thanks for sharing.
Creative vintage dressing at its finest!