I am New York City based design historian specializing in the history of American fashion. I use object-based methods to bridge global design history with American cultural history and focus on issues of identity formation and the politics of representation
My writing bridges the scholarly and popular. My first monograph; Westernwear: Postwar American Fashion and Culture that examines western style after World War II is available from Bloomsbury publishing. I was a founding member and senior editor of Worn Fashion Journal, and have contributed to journals such as Fashion Theory and The Journal of Design History. Presently, I teach graduate and undergraduate courses at Parsons School of Design, The Fashion Institute of Technology, and Fordham University, and curated the exhibition “Crafting Denim”
Hands-on work with clothes includes costume collections at New York City museums in addition to close to two decades as a vintage clothing dealer. I sourced, identified, and maintained a working collection of rare vintage clothing that catered primarily to collectors, design archives, and the film and television industry.
