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The 1930s

Hollywood glamour, surrealism

Evening dress, House of Vionnet, 1938
Madeleine Vionnet · 1938

Soft drape and defined structure offered contrasting ways to dress. Cinema spread glamorous images while couture explored both the body’s outline and the possibilities of illusion.

Key styles

Defining work of the 1930s

Selected examples dated to this decade.

Designers active in the 1930s

Evening dress, House of Vionnet, Spring/Summer 1932

Madeleine Vionnet

Spring/Summer 1932

Used bias cutting and precise geometry to create fluid gowns that moved with the body.

Evening jacket, Schiaparelli, summer 1937

Elsa Schiaparelli

summer 1937

Turned collaborations with Dalí and Cocteau into Surrealist garments, unexpected imagery and visual illusions.

Evening ensemble, House of Patou, ca. 1931

Jean Patou

ca. 1931

Helped define refined early-1930s evening dress through long, softly draped silhouettes and adaptable capes.

Evening dress, House of Lelong, early 1930s

Lucien Lelong

early 1930s

Directed couture that ranged from narrow evening lines to full skirts with elaborate floral appliqué.

Dress, Augustabernard, ca. 1932

Augusta Bernard

ca. 1932

Made drape and asymmetry the focus of minimally ornamented silk evening dresses.

Evening dress, Elizabeth Hawes, ca. 1935

Elizabeth Hawes

ca. 1935

Joined comfort and inventive construction in adjustable evening dresses, unusual fabrics and subtle optical effects.

Suit, Marcel Rochas, mid-1930s

Marcel Rochas

mid-1930s

Balanced fluid, ruffled evening dresses with belted wool suits and clearly organized tailoring.

Evening dress, Valentina, 1939

Valentina

1939

Applied precise bias drapery to stage and evening dress, including Katharine Cornell’s 1939 gown.

The world behind
the wardrobe.

Longer skirts and a return to the natural waist changed the fashionable silhouette in the 1930s. Evening gowns often followed the body, with bias cutting helping fabric fall in soft, fluid lines. Hollywood films and their stars spread glamorous fashions to large audiences, while Paris couture continued to shape evening dress. Daytime clothes commonly had defined waists and increasingly prominent shoulders. Elsa Schiaparelli’s collaborations with artists offered a different kind of visibility, using visual illusion and unexpected imagery.

1930s

Cinema spreads fashion

Film stars and screen costumes brought fashionable silhouettes to audiences far beyond couture clients.

1930s

The bias cut

Cutting fabric diagonally across its grain helped create the decade’s flowing, body-skimming evening dresses.

1937–38

Surrealist collaborations

Schiaparelli worked with Cocteau and Dalí on garments and accessories that turned visual illusion into fashion.

Browse all 32 designers

Designers active in this decade. Available garment examples may come from another period; their dates are labeled.

32 of 32 shown

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FIT Fashion History Timeline: 1930–1939V&A: Art Deco fashionThe Met: Elsa Schiaparelli
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