Facades

'Facades' brings together 128 of the best architectural settings and fashions from a 200-year period. Within the confines of Manhattan were found Egyptian temples and Russian cathedrals. Beaux-Arts mansions and Gothic Revival churches, Art Deco office buildings, and High Victorian department stores.

Bill Cunningham started out in 1969, finding antique clothes in New York's thrift shops, street fairs, and auctions, with no idea how far back he could go (he made it to 1770). These wonderful costumes are worn by Editta Sherman, the Duchess of Carnegie Hall, as she poses for the camera in virtually every corner of Manhattan. Cunningham and the Duchess do away with the strict decorum and postures of the period (and of fashion photography past and present) and capture in photographs and text, and intelligent blend of fashion and architectural history, a spirit of playful animation, and the elusive sense of the past.