Valentina

Valentina Nicholaevna Sanina Schlee was a fashion designer in New York from the 1920s through the 1950s. She was born in Kiev, Ukraine in 1899 and immigrated to New York at the outset of the Russian Revolution. She became well known for her turbans and flowing dresses, utilizing the bias cuts of Madeleine Vionnet. She constructed elegant, modern, and exotic dresses for famous women, such as Katharine Hepburn, Greta Garbo, Gloria Swanson, Millicent Rogers, and Audrey Hepburn. She died in September 1989.

Valentina: American Couture and the Cult of Celebrity was published by Rizzoli New York in February 2009 in association with the Museum of the City of New York's exhibition Valentina: New York Couture and the Cult of the Celebrity. It was written by Kohle Yohannan, the curator and design historian.

Valentina: American Couture and the Cult of Celebrity is featured in Edition: Rizzoli: Fashion

Valentina in 1951. Photo by John Lee, Courtesy of Nina Frantzen
Valentina in 1951. Photo by John Lee, Courtesy of Nina Frantzen
Valentina posing for a Vogue editorial shot by Horst, wearing a bias-cut, wrap-and-tie jersey evening dress, March 1941. Photo by Horst. Private Collection, New York.
Valentina in period inspired silk taffeta gown named You Been Wrong, October 1952. Photo courtesy of Gary and Manya Drobnack
Valentina in 1919. Inscribed in Russian: V Sanina Sevastopol July 1919. Estate of Valentina Schlee
Valentina. Photo by Horst- courtesy of Vogue and Conde Nast
Jean Patchett in a lace-eyelet head wrap and Valentina day dress with matching drawstring capelette, Vogue, May 1, 1952. Photo by Sir Cecil Beaton- Courtesy of Vogue and Conde Nast
Contact sheet of Valentina, circa 1960. Courtesy of Nina Frantzen