Salvador Dalí | waldina

Not everyone can look like this at age 81, but everyone can be inspired to stay active and interested and be fearless. This woman has had a life. Ladies and gentlemen, Carmen Dell’Orefice. Style Icon.

Born: June 3, 1931 (age 81) New York, NY, USA
Occupation: Model
Height: 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m)
Hair color: Silver
Eye color: Hazel
Measurements: US 36-26-39; EU 91.5-66-99
Dress size: US, 8; EU, 38

Carmen Dell’Orefice (born June 3, 1931) is an American model and actress, born in New York, NY. She is known within the fashion industry for being the world’s oldest working model as of the Spring/Summer 2012 season. She covered Vogue at the mere age of 15, and has been modelling ever since.

Carmen’s parents were Italian and Hungarian. They were constantly breaking up and getting back together. Because of this, Carmen lived in foster homes and sometimes with other relatives.

In 1942, Carmen reunited with her mother and moved to New York City. At the age of 13, while riding a bus to ballet class, she was approached to model by the wife of photographer Herman Landschoff. Her test photos, taken at Jones Beach, were a “flop” according to Carmen. Her godfather though introduced her to Vogue, where Carmen signed a contract for $7.50 per hour in 1946 at age 15. Carmen became a favoured model of photographer Erwin Blumenfeld who took her first Vogue cover in 1947. She appears in the December 15, 1947 issue of US Vogue as Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White and Cinderella along with supermodel Dorian Leigh, actors Ray Bolger and Jose Ferrer.

Despite modeling, Carmen and her mother were poor. They had no telephone and Vogue sent runners to their apartment to let Carmen know about modeling jobs. She roller-skated to assignments to save bus fares. Carmen was so malnourished that famed fashion photographers Horst P. Horst and Cecil Beaton had to pin back dresses and stuff her body with tissue. Carmen and her mother were also accomplished seamstresses and made extra money making clothes. One of their customers was Dorian Leigh. Carmen would later become best friends with Dorian’s younger sister, model Suzy Parker. Together they would be bridesmaids at Dorian’s second wedding to Roger Mehle in 1948.

In 1947, Carmen got a raise to $10–$25 per hour. She appeared on the October 1947 cover of Vogue, at age 16, one of the youngest Vogue cover models ever (along with Niki Taylor, Brooke Shields, and Monika Schnarre). Carmen was also on the November 1948 cover of Vogue. She worked with the most famous fashion photographers of the era including Irving Penn, Gleb Derujinsky, Francesco Scavullo, Norman Parkinson, and Richard Avedon. Carmen was photographed by Melvin Sokolsky for Harper’s Bazaar in 1960. The iconic image titled Carmen Las Meninas is world famous and has been collected internationally. Sokolsky also photographed Carmen for the classic Vanity Fair Lingerie campaign in which Carmen obscures her face with her hand. She also became Salvador Dalí’s muse.

Despite early successes at a very young age, modeling agent Eileen Ford refused to represent her and Vogue lost interest in her. After doctors prescribed shots to start puberty, she instead started working for catalogs and lingerie, making $300 per hour. It was then that she joined Ford in 1953.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Carmen lost most of her money in the stock market. She was forced to auction off her famous modeling photographs from the 1940s-1980s through Sotheby’s.

In 1994, with what little money she had left, and with money from boyfriend Norman Levy, she invested with Bernie Madoff. For twelve years, Ruth and Bernie Madoff and Carmen and Norman Levy were a “foursome”, traveling and partying together on lavish yachts.

Levy died in 2005, at age 93, and Madoff was the executor of his will, which had $244 million in assets, according to Carmen. Madoff further used this money to lure in about 13,500 individuals and charities. She continued to regularly have dinner with the Madoffs after Levy’s death.

In December 2008 a 68-year-old friend, who invested her life savings with Madoff, telephoned Carmen to inform her that she too had been swindled. Carmen said, “For the second time in my life, I’ve lost all of my life savings.”.

In April 2009, Carmen was interviewed for Vanity Fair magazine’s story “Madoff’s World”. Photographs of Carmen and photographs she took of Madoff appear in this article.

Carmen Dell’Orefice – Style Icon.

Braniff International Airways was an American airline that operated from 1928 until 1982, primarily in the midwestern and southwestern U.S., South America, Panama, and in its later years also Asia and Europe. The airline ceased operations on May 12, 1982, due to factors including escalating fuel prices, aggressive and unsustainable expansion, and fierce competition following changes that resulted from the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978.

New Mexico architect Alexander Girard, Italian fashion designer Emilio Pucci, and shoe designer Beth Levine were called in, and with this new creative talent, Braniff began the “End of the Plain Plane” campaign.

Girard outfitted the interiors with 57 different variations of Herman Miller fabrics. Fifteen colors were used by Braniff for plane exteriors during the 1960s (Harper & George modified Girard’s original seven colors in 1968). Many of the color schemes were applied to aircraft interiors, gate lounges, ticket offices, and even the corporate headquarters. Art to complement the color schemes was flown in from Mexico, Latin America, and South America.

Pucci used a series of nautical themes in overhauling the crew’s uniforms. For the stewardesses, Pucci used “space age” themes, including plastic “space bubbles” (resembling Captain Video helmets) which the stewardesses could wear between the terminal and the plane to prevent hairstyles from being disturbed. However, the “space bubble” was dropped after about a month because the helmets cracked easily, there was no place to store them on the aircraft, and jetways at many airports made them unnecessary. For the footwear, Beth Levine created plastic boots and designed two-tone calfskin boots and shoes. Stewardesses were called “hostesses” at Braniff and were attired with uniforms and accessories composed of interchangeable parts which could be removed and added as needed. In 1969, Pucci designed “Pucci IV”, for the intro of “747 Braniff Place” (1971). The collection was debuted at the Dallas Hilton by Pucci himself, in 1970. Today all of the vintage Pucci attire designed for Braniff is valuable.

In 1968, under the leadership of Mary Wells and Jack Tinker, Braniff expanded the advertising campaign that showed the likenesses of Andy Warhol, Sonny Liston, Salvador Dalí, Whitey Ford, the Playboy Bunny, and other celebrities of the time, all flying Braniff. It became one of the most celebrated marketing efforts Madison Avenue had ever produced, blending style and arrogance. One advertising slogan was “if you’ve got it — flaunt it!” Although management considered the campaign a success, Braniff’s core customers were outraged by the grandiose behavior and perceived “bragging”, causing many corporate accounts to leave Braniff.

In 1977, Braniff dropped Pucci as its designer of uniforms. American fashion and couture designer Halston was then brought on to bring a more American look back to Braniff. His all-leather looks—dubbed the “Ultra” look—were applied to uniforms and the fleet, including Braniff’s new Boeing 727-200s (and the “Flying Colors” planes as well). His uniforms and simplistic design were praised by critics and passengers.