Photo by Horst P. Horst|Conde Nast via Getty Images
The artist, photographed here by Horst P. Horst, stands elegantly attired in her studio surrounded by her work. Vanderbilt's husband, Wyatt Cooper, once said of his wife, “She is as crisp as gingham, as sensuous as satin, and as inscrutable as velvet.”
Fashion designer Gloria Vanderbilt often incorporated flowers in her artistic creations. The blooms didn’t necessarily appear in botanically correct ways but rather in fabric designs and paintings that brightened her surroundings. Ever the romantic, Vanderbilt used flowers to highlight aspects of a room, to reinforce certain colors or textures, and, if she happened to be photographed in that room, to subtly coordinate with what she was wearing.
Photo by Annie Schlechter
Vanderbilt’s collage titled "Elizabeth the Queen" had pride of place in her home.
Photo by Horst P. Horst|Condé Nast via Getty Images
Vanderbilt with sons Carter and Anderson Cooper.
Photo by Horst P. Horst|Conde Nast via Getty Images
Vanderbilt in her garden-like, flower-filled, and unapologetically feminine apartment
Several photographs by Horst P. Horst, one of the most influential fashion photographers of the mid-20th century, illustrate Vanderbilt’s ability to connect herself with botanicals. In one image, she plays up pink in a silk shawl with pink flowers nearby—all accenting the same hues in the floral fabric covering the sofa. In another photo with her two sons, Anderson and Carter, the designer poses on her bed where burgundy and white tulips mirror the burgundy of the boys’ silk pajamas, the white of her dressing gown, and the colors in the wallpaper.
The tulip-and-auricula fabric Vanderbilt created for Bloomcraft was inspired by the 19th-century porcelain tulip vases in her collection.
In Vanderbilt’s world, it was as if everything could be knitted together as a whole, perhaps particularly poignant given her difficult childhood. Her early years were centered around a custody battle over her that was waged between her mother, Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt, and her aunt, sculptor and philan- thropist Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. “The trial of the century,” as it was considered at the time, made “Little Gloria” a household name long before she ever picked up the first pen to sketch one of her iconic fashion designs. However, these early challenges ultimately did nothing to impair Vanderbilt’s energy, determination, and intense creativity—in fact, they may have been the catalysts, as is the case with so many artists. And while she was well known as a novelist, actress, and model, she truly was an artist first and foremost.
This painting by Vanderbilt is titled Still Life with Tiger Lilies.
Vanderbilt poured her creativity into rooms, fabrics, collages, and paintings in a style uniquely her own but often invoking characteristics of works by Matisse or Chagall. One such example was her famous patchwork-quilt bedroom. The space was covered in a multitude of quilt patterns, and every scrap was applied by Vanderbilt herself. She purposely left the curtains unlined to allow sunlight to filter through, creating a stained-glass effect. And in this room, along with so many others, she layered the materials in her collages to add texture and more pattern.
Vanderbilt’s “Lily of the Valley” hand-painted champagne flutes from a licensed collection in the ‘70s.
I remember the early ‘70s when Vanderbilt created products under license, one of the first designers to do so. Her eponymous jeans by Murjani spawned a multi-million- dollar business. But what captured my attention most were her fabrics for Bloomcraft with their big bouquets of tulips, as well as her china painted with hot pink geraniums and her hand-painted glasses with lilies of the valley. Every floral-inspired item was imbued with Vanderbilt’s personality, point of view, and love of life.
The clean, graphic quality of her designs, coupled with bold palettes, had visual and commercial appeal. Gingham checks were ubiquitous in Vanderbilt’s oeuvre, increasing the popularity of the simple pattern—if Gloria Vanderbilt was using it, then everyone wanted to follow. When Vanderbilt’s photo, taken by Francesco Scavullo, appeared on the cover of Town & Country in 2010, the caption said it best: “There will never be another Gloria Vanderbilt.”
By Charlotte Moss
With a lifelong love of gardening, designer Charlotte Moss has long been intrigued with what draws people—especially women—into the world of horticulture. She has a forthcoming book with Rizzoli on the subject of gardening women, set to release in 2026.
