There are many trailblazing POC designers in the fashion industry – specifically Black people – who moved onward and upward in the art despite being in a white, male-dominated industry. This is especially relevant to Ann Lowe, a fashion designer who slayed the game and left these other designers in the dust with her talent during the late 1920s until she died in 1981.
Born in 1898 in Clayton, Alabama, Lowe was the first Black fashion designer in America to reach legendary status. From the jump, she was a fashion design prodigy. At the age of five, she was sewing, creating a foundation of skill that included crafting beautiful flowers out of fabric, a detail that would become her signature. Her design abilities flourished, and she eventually uprooted to New York to attend S. T. Taylor Design School.
Seeing as though it was an extra racist time in history, Lowe was the only Black student at the school, but she paid them no mind as she excelled past her peers. She graduated in less time than usual because her skills surpassed her classmates.
She would go on to open the doors to her own shop in Tampa, Florida, before heading to New York in 1928, where she would gain a prominent name in the fashion world. She created exquisite gowns and dresses for elite socialites and other high-society, wealthy women. She sold her creations at the best shops in NYC at the time: Neiman Marcus, Henri Bendel, and Saks Fifth Avenue.
Despite discrimination and being undervalued, Lowe silenced the noise by becoming the first Black designer to open a couture salon on swanky Madison Avenue. Lowe talents would pave the way for her to become a foundational figure in the world of American couture – specifically for creating Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy’s gorgeous 1953 wedding gown.
She received long-delayed and well-deserved recognition later in her life and posthumously. Her gowns and legacy continue to be honored in major museums like the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
