Jul 27, 2020

Styles: Dovima Pastel Inspiration

This joint collection between Manuel Monand Gonzalo Zarauzais a homage to the first women who dared to be models during the 20th century. Women of stunning beauty who had the courage to work as models during a time when they were looked down upon. One of them was Dorothy Virginia Margaret Juba, a young New Yorker who worked in a sweet shop.

Dovima was the name that she invented for herself using the first two letters of each of her names. One day whilst leaving a restaurant, fate led her to cross paths with an editor of Vogue. Soon after she was posing for the best fashion photographers in the world and was paid a record $30 per hour by the Ford agency which employed her. She was elegant, distinguished and her mysterious smile was compared to that of Gioconda. Her work is part of the history of fashion.

Dovima was one of Richard Avedon’s revolutionary models, uninhibited and unrestricted. He photographed her on many occasions, but the photograph that went around the world and that holds the record of being the most expensive photo by Avedon is “Dovima with elephants” which in 2010 was auctioned in Paris by Christie’s and fetched the figure of € 841.00. After her death Richard Avedon said:

“The last of the aristocratic, elegant beauties ... The most remarkable and original beauty of her time.”