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The Arts Intel Report

Wiener Werkstätte Fashion and Accessories

June 10 – Sept 5, 2021
1048 5th Ave, New York, NY 10028, United States

When we think of the Wiener Werkstätte (Vienna Workshops), founded in 1903, we tend to think of stylized metal-and-glass objects, furniture and fabrics for the home. But the Werkstätte actually started with accessories and jewelry. Josef Hoffmann and Koloman Moser were its founding designers, and Carl Otto Czeschka and Dagobert Peche joined the firm later. The success of Vienna’s dressmaking Flöge Sisters, whose salon the Werkstätte designed, inspired its move, in 1910, to open a fashion department. In this exhibition, jewelry, accoutrements, garments, and fashion postcards make for a concentrated tutorial in Wiener Werkstätte style. If the museum’s restaurant, Café Sabarsky, is open, stop in for a glass of Wiener Eiskaffee—chilled coffee with vanilla ice cream, topped with whipped cream and cocoa powder. Divine. —L.J.