Sybil Connolly (24 January 1921 – 6 May 1998) was a

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...

-based fashion designer who was known for creating fashion from Irish textiles, including finely

pleated linen Pleated linen is a form of processing linen which results in a fabric which is heavily pleated and does not crease like normal linen fabric. History The earliest form of pleated linen dates from ancient Egypt and can be seen in a garment known ...

, wools such as Báinín,

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and Carrickmacross lace, and later for her work with brands such as Tiffany & Co. Her fashion label's clients included

Jacqueline Kennedy Jacqueline Lee Kennedy Onassis ( ; July 28, 1929 – May 19, 1994) was an American socialite, writer, photographer, and book editor who served as first lady of the United States from 1961 to 1963, as the wife of President John F. Kennedy. A po ...

. Said to have put Irish fashion on the map, she was a member of the "Big Three" Irish fashion designers (along with Irene Gilbert and Raymond Kenna/Kay Peterson), and was described by former

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(prime minister)

Jack Lynch John Mary Lynch (15 August 1917 – 20 October 1999) was an Irish Fianna Fáil politician who served as Taoiseach from 1966 to 1973 and 1977 to 1979, Leader of Fianna Fáil from 1966 to 1979, Leader of the Opposition from 1973 to 1977, Ministe ...

as: "a national treasure." Her activities were covered in both the fashion press and the social columns of publications such as the Hollywood Reporter. Described by Bettina Ballard as a "personable milk-skinned Irish charmer," she came to the notice of Carmel Snow, the Dalkey-born editor of ''

Harpers Bazaar ''Harper's Bazaar'' is an American monthly women's fashion magazine. It was first published in New York City on November 2, 1867, as the weekly ''Harper's Bazar''. ''Harper's Bazaar'' is published by Hearst and considers itself to be the st ...

''.

Early life and career

Sybil Veronica Connolly was born on Clanllienwen Road, in Morriston, Swansea,

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

. Sybil was the eldest of two daughters of Evelyn Connolly (née Reynolds) from

and John Connolly, an insurance salesman from

Waterford "Waterford remains the untaken city" , mapsize = 220px , pushpin_map = Ireland#Europe , pushpin_map_caption = Location within Ireland##Location within Europe , pushpin_relief = 1 , coordinates ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. Her education came largely from her Welsh grandfather and private tutors. Her father died while she was a teenager and the family moved to Waterford, Ireland, where she spent two years at the local Our Lady of Mercy School, Military Road, Waterford. At seventeen her interest in clothes led her to be apprenticed to a London dressmaking company run by two Irish brothers, Jim and Comerford Bradley in London. Here she worked for their prestigious firm of Bradley & Co – whose clients included Queen Mary. Connolly would attend Buckingham Palace fittings where she was allowed to hold the pins. Returning to Ireland in 1940, she worked for the Dublin store Richard Alan, remaining unknown to the general public, for the next thirteen years, until she replaced the French-Canadian head designer, Gaston Mallet in 1953. She was invited by Jack Clarke to produce the next season's range. Here her work was spotted by American buyers. She was known already for her textiles, including the crystal pleated linen that was said to take nine yards of material for each yard of finished cloth. It is said that she received her initial training at

The Grafton Academy The Grafton Academy of Fashion Design is a third level college based in Dublin, Ireland. It offers an undergraduate 3-year full-time Diploma course in Fashion Design as well as short courses in Fashion Design, dressmaking, pattern drafting, ...

Establishment of label

Connolly's first major fashion show was held at Dunsany Castle in 1953. Photographer Richard Dormer used the house and its grounds for a shoot of Connolly's clothes and one picture – showing model Anne Gunning in a full-length red Kinsale cape and white crochet evening dress – made the cover of

Life Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for Cell growth, growth, reaction to Stimu ...

magazine in August 1953 under the heading 'Irish invade fashion world'." The show was a huge success – thanks in part to ''

'' editor Carmel Snow. It was attended by American press and buyers and Connolly’s career took off rapidly after that, especially in the United States. Connolly wisely capitalised on this publicity by travelling with her collection to the US later that year, where she made another life-long friend, Eleanor Lambert, doyenne of American fashion publicists. Avedon's photographs of Connolly and her fashions also ran in ''

'' of October 1953. Connolly officially launched her couture label in 1957; she was 36. Part of Connolly's success may be attributed to her flair for publicity. She was also a glamorous advert for her brand – a 1954 feature in ''Housewife'' magazine gushed: "this fairytale person has looks. Short curling dark hair. Eyes the brown of peat...And a model figure too". She was made part of the

International Best Dressed List The International Best-Dressed Hall of Fame List was founded by fashionista Eleanor Lambert in 1940 as an attempt to boost the reputation of American fashion at the time. The American magazine '' Vanity Fair'' is currently in charge of the List ...

Hall of Fame in 1965. As her profile continued to rise in the United States, so did her client list – with

Julie Andrews Dame Julie Andrews (born Julia Elizabeth Wells; 1 October 1935) is an English actress, singer, and author. She has garnered numerous accolades throughout her career spanning over seven decades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy ...

and

Elizabeth Taylor Dame Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor (February 27, 1932 – March 23, 2011) was a British-American actress. She began her career as a child actress in the early 1940s and was one of the most popular stars of classical Hollywood cinema in the 1950s. ...

wearing her clothes. Notably, Jacqueline Kennedy wore a Sybil Connolly pleated linen dress when she sat for an official Aaron Shikler

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest, Washington, D.C., NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. preside ...

portrait in 1970. Many of her designs were sold, via private shows, to prominent social names such as Mellon, Rockefeller and Dupont family members. By the time she was profiled in the ''

Saturday Evening Post ''The Saturday Evening Post'' is an American magazine, currently published six times a year. It was issued weekly under this title from 1897 until 1963, then every two weeks until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely ...

'' in November 1957, three-quarters of Sybil Connolly's gross earnings (then estimated at $500,000 per annum) originate in sales to the United States. She broadened her export market via a friendship with the newspaper magnate Frank Packer, with two heavily publicised visits to Australia in October 1954 and August 1957. In the late 1950s, she was employing around 100 women, half of them working from their own homes where they wove tweed or handmade lace. Among her assignments was to redesign habits for three orders of nuns – the

Sisters of Mercy The Sisters of Mercy is a religious institute of Catholic women founded in 1831 in Dublin, Ireland, by Catherine McAuley. As of 2019, the institute had about 6200 sisters worldwide, organized into a number of independent congregations. They ...

in the United States and two Irish orders.

Brand hallmarks

Connolly was adept at reworking traditional Irish fabrics and styles – including peasant blouses, flannel petticoats and shawls – to give them contemporary appeal and glamour. She took the red flannel traditionally used for petticoats in Connemara and turned it into huge billowing peasant skirts. Vawn Corrigan cites her importance in the re-imagination of Donegal tweed. She made one skirt out of men's linen handkerchiefs, and in 1954 a summer dress out of striped linen tea towels, called the "Kitchen Fugue", leading her to be praised by Bazaar as someone with an "intuitively facile hand". Perhaps her most distinctive contribution to fashion was pleated handkerchief linen – as worn by Jackie Kennedy in the official White House portrait – it took up to nine yards of Irish linen handkerchiefs to create one yard of the uncrushable pleated fabric that she pioneered. Designs were created in Ireland, and Connolly employed up to 100 women, mostly crocheting and weaving in their own homes. Although there was intricate craft in her designs, prices were lower than the typical European couture label. Connolly worked directly with the cloth, without preliminary sketches.

The First Love dress

Sybil Connolly's signature design was the dress made from pleated handkerchief linen. The first pleated handkerchief linen garment to be shown in the United States was a white evening dress called First Love. It required three hundred handkerchiefs and contained more than five thousand pleats. Time magazine described it as "the dress that brought the house down" in the grand ballroom of the Waldorf Astoria, where it showed in March 1953 alongside Europe's top designers of the time, including Dior, Balenciaga and Visconti. The First Love dress was made in the Clarke's Richard and Alan shop in 58 Grafton Street, Dublin, where Sybil Connolly worked for more than 10 years. In 1953 Connolly had only very recently begun designing dresses for the business. In July 1954, Richard Clarke married Dorothy, and she wore the First Love Dress for the occasion. After the wedding, Dorothy had it shortened and wore it to dress dances. Almost 60 years later, when her granddaughter Anna Clarke got engaged, she asked her grandfather if she could wear it on her own big day. The dress was repaired and restored by freelance textile conservator Rachel Phelan in 2013, and Anna Clarke actually got to wear it.

Later career

Her home, Number 71

Merrion Square Merrion Square () is a Georgian garden square on the southside of Dublin city centre. History The square was laid out in 1752 by the estate of Viscount FitzWilliam and was largely complete by the beginning of the 19th century. The demand ...

– which she described as "the house that linen built" – became a showcase for her taste and private clients would be served jasmine tea by a butler called James. Located in one of the most fashionable areas of Dublin, it was what she called a "shop window for Ireland". In the 1980s, Connolly began designing for luxury goods makers Tiffany & Co.,

Tipperary Crystal Tipperary Crystal is an Irish design company based in Dublin. Tipperary Crystal is an Irish crystal design and manufacturing company founded in 1987 by former Waterford Crystal Waterford Crystal is a manufacturer of lead glass or "crystal" ...

, Brunschwig & Fils and Schumacher. Sybil also revived interest in the designs of

Mary Delany Mary Delany ( Granville; 14 May 1700 – 15 April 1788) was an English artist, letter-writer, and bluestocking, known for her "paper-mosaicks" and botanic drawing, needlework and her lively correspondence. Early life Mary Delany was born at C ...

(1700-1788), basing a series of Tiffany & Co. tableware on her floral embroidery. In her later career Connolly began designing interior fabrics and wallpapers. In the 1980s she became involved with the restoration of The Swiss Cottage, Cahir, Co. Tipperary. The Cottage was originally built in the early 1800s by Richard Butler, 1st Earl of Glengall and based on a design by Regency architect John Nash. The cottage is rustic in style with a distinguished thatched roof. The interior theme was based on nature. Such was Connolly's interest in the restoration she helped to raise funds for the project. The Swiss Cottage opened to the public in 1989. In 1991, Connolly received an honorary doctoral degree (

LLD Legum Doctor (Latin: “teacher of the laws”) (LL.D.) or, in English, Doctor of Laws, is a doctorate-level academic degree in law or an honorary degree, depending on the jurisdiction. The double “L” in the abbreviation#Plural forms, abbrev ...

) from the

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. In 2012, Connolly's work attracted renewed interest when actor

Gillian Anderson Gillian Leigh Anderson ( ; born August 9, 1968) is an American actress. Her credits include the roles of FBI Special Agent Dana Scully in the series ''The X-Files'', ill-fated socialite Lily Bart in Terence Davies's film '' The House of Mirt ...

wore a vintage dress by the designer for the BAFTAs. The

Hunt Museum The Hunt Museum ( ga, Iarsmalann Hunt) is a museum in the city of Limerick, Ireland. The Hunt Museum holds a personal collection donated by the Hunt family, it was originally situated in the University of Limerick, before being moved to its pr ...

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houses examples of her work. In 2018, the museum released images of Sybil's designs into the

Public Domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly waived, or may be inapplicable. Because those rights have expired, ...

Gallery

Dresses

File:Heiress dress 1957 by Sybil Connolly - Full Length Front.jpg, Heiress gown from 1957 with chevron pleated handkerchief linen. File:Pink Ice Gown by Sybil Connolly.jpg, Pink Ice gown with Carrickmacross appliqué lace. File:Lavender evening gown by Sybil Connolly.jpg, Lavender evening gown with gossamer pleated linen. File:Wedding two-piece by Sybil Connolly - Full Length Front.jpg, Wedding two-piece outfit in pleated linen. The skirt is based on the design of the ‘First Love’ dress. File:Gold Short Jacket by Sybil Connolly.jpg, Gold Lace Jacket File:Washer Woman skirt 1957 by Sybil Connolly.jpg, Red Flannel Wool, Quilted skirt File:Deep petrol blue evening gown by Sybil Connolly.jpg, Full-length petrol blue silk evening gown File:White Crochet dress designed by Sybil Connolly - Full Length Front.jpg, White Crochet dress designed by Sybil Connolly, Full Length Front File:White Crochet dress designed by Sybil Connolly - Full Length Back.jpg, White Crochet dress designed by Sybil Connolly, Full Length Back File:Black Lace kaftan “Illusion” by Sybil Connolly- Full length FRONT.jpg, Black Lace kaftan “Illusion”-Front- File:Black Lace kaftan “Illusion” by Sybil Connolly - Full Length Back.jpg, Black Lace kaftan “Illusion”-Back- File:Green Pleated Linen Dress, 'Irish Moss' by Sybil Connolly - Full Length Back.jpg, Green Pleated Linen Dress- Front- File:Green Pleated Linen Dress, 'Irish Moss' by Sybil Connolly - Full Length Front.jpg, Green Pleated Linen Dress- Back- File:Green Poplin Skirt by Sybil Connolly- full length front.jpg, Green Poplin Skirt by Sybil Connolly- Front- File:Green Poplin Skirt by Sybil Connolly- Detail.jpg, Green Poplin Skirt by Sybil Connolly- Details-

Sketches

File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Interpretaion.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Blushing.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Lace.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Tara.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Orange parfait.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Dolphin.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Tango.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Enchantment.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Deerstalker.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Whisper.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Lady B.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, White Lilac.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Trans Season.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, White wool.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, C Vanney.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Blackbird.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Pink Parfait.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, V.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Almond.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Turquoise Plum.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Best Behaviour.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Night Drifter.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Green Pleated Coat.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Frill Detail Dress.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Brown & White Plaid.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Gentle Atmosphere.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Tweed Delight.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Cream Puff.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Black & White Coat.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Carrickmacross Lace Dress.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Many Pannelled Dress.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Cloak with cape.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Young Evening.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Frill Collar Dress.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Almond II.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Ivory Tusk.tif File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Tie-collar Dress.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Dress with Bow Front.tiff File:Design Sketch by Sybil Connolly, Skirt Suit.tif

References

Bibliography

*Connolly, Sybil ''Irish Hands: The Tradition of Beautiful Crafts'', Hearst Books, 1995.

External links

*
Hunt Museum online exhibition of Sybil Connolly‘Fashion With An Irish Brogue’: The Life And Legacy Of Sybil Connolly
of models wearing Sybil's fashions * {{DEFAULTSORT:Connolly, Sybil 1921 births 1998 deaths Irish fashion designers Businesspeople from Dublin (city) People from Swansea Irish women fashion designers British expatriates in Ireland