Charlotte Perriand -- most certainly an “It” girl. She donned a Josephine Baker hairstyle, wore a short, breezy graphic dress hinting at an exposed knee, and wrapped her neck with a chromium-plated ball-bearing necklace she designed for herself.She was spirited, independent, liberated and brilliant. The "It" girl in those days symbolized tremendous progress women were making in society. First coined in 1927 to describe the actress Clara Bow’s sex appeal and sass, the “It” girl was a “New Woman” -- the modern woman who broke through the repressions of the past. She embraced life, held a strange magnetism, and was fully and naturally confident.
Charlotte was formally trained, well-read and determined to develop a style relevant to the "machine age". At 24, she walked into Le Corbusier’s studio and asked him to hire her as a furniture designer. His response was: “We don’t embroider cushions here,” and showed her the door.
Unfettered, she worked on her own and exhibited her project titled "Bar Under the Roof” at the Salon d'Automne of 1927. She aimed at providing affordable cutting-edge designs for the middle class consumer. She had placed a bar in a small attic. Finished the counter top with nickel-plated steel and added high stools and tables clad in in the same material. Across from the bar she had a card table and low seats upholstered in pink and blue-violet leather. Shiny hard metal plated forms with lots of reflective surfaces -- quite a difference from the more “traditional” styles of Art Deco.There is no decoration, no colorful patterning, no soft textures, no pictures on the walls, or knick-knacks, rugs or wall coverings. She brought the new materials from the outside in transforming a private space and its insulated world into something modern and into something most people could afford.
A woman designing and presenting a bar at that time was ballsy.
It spoke to a different audience and it was acclaimed by the critics. Shortly afterward Le Corbusier hired her.
A true humanitarian, she was determined to reveal new ways of living. She created some of the most significant furniture designs of the 20th century not only aesthetically, but by providing better solutions that were also affordable for the middle class. Modernity was no longer exclusively for the wealthy.
So when the “It” girls are talked about today, and splashed across pages of glossy magazines, or followed on film driving about after slugging back five apple martinis, making soft porn movies or flashing unmentionables, let’s pause and think for a moment . . . these are our “It” girls.