A hundred years before the Met Gala, there was Caramoor’s Lucie Rosen

Photograph of Lucie Rosen in 1935 by Cecil Beaton; custom dress by Alan Kramer, aka Prince Tirtoff. PHOTOS COURTESY OF CARAMOOR

By JOYCE CORRIGAN

At that great Met Gala in the sky, Lucie Bigelow Rosen — New York socialite, musical visionary, and first mistress of Katonah’s Caramoor — is holding court in a fantastical custom-made frock (medieval was a favorite theme) while mingling with the Morgans, Whitneys, Kahns and other luminaries of the 1920s and ‘30s.

A full 100 years before Anna Wintour’s high-wattage fashion affair, Lucie Rosen’s perch on every glittering guest list was assured. Born into a prominent Manhattan family, she married financier Walter Rosen, an arts patron and trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She was also an accomplished theremin virtuoso long before electronic music was a thing, and was photographed by Cecil Beaton, Baron Adolph de Meyer and Edward Steichen for leading fashion magazines like Vogue.

Her strikingly distinct and opulent style, of course, extended to Caramoor, the splendid Katonah estate she and Walter transformed into a treasure house of medieval and Renaissance art. In 1945, they donated the property to become the music and arts center it is today. 

Now, with the exhibition “Inside Lucie’s Wardrobe,” which debuted May 16, the doors to Lucie Rosen’s closet have opened for the first time in more than three decades. Installed in the Rosen House, the intimate show features newly uncovered research, rare photographs and garments she treasured and meticulously preserved.

The legendary Edward Steichen photographed Lucie Rosen for Vogue in 1926.

“Two things always surprise visitors about Lucie,” said director of interpretation, collection and archives, Jessa Krick. “First, that her exquisite clothes have been right upstairs in her room at Caramoor for more than 80 years. And second, that unlike today’s celebrities, who wear red-carpet looks once, Lucie wore her favorite gowns again and again.” Spying little signs of wear is unexpectedly endearing.

Highlights include a stamped silk-velvet evening coat purchased directly from the great master Mariano Fortuny in Venice, Italy, in 1925, and a fanciful costume inspired by Botticelli’s “Primavera.”

The exhibition’s sleek Art Deco-style mannequins, loaned by the Met from its recent Karl Lagerfeld exhibition, echo the elongated silhouettes and sculpted waves of America’s first modern women — of which Lucie Bigelow Rosen certainly was one.

“Lucie loved the drama of a fancy-dress ball and once dressed as a boy in a medieval page’s tunic,” Krick offered. “We also have a wonderful photograph of her performing on the theremin in an otherworldly velvet ensemble.”

From left, Lucie Rosen’s stamped silk evening coat by Fortuny, which she bought on a 1925 trip to the designer’s atelier in Venice, Italy. Lucie Rosen’s 1955 silk day dress, which could be worn today

At the recent Met Gala, the Caramoor-couture connection closed the loop when jazz percussionist and bandleader Jon Batiste, one of Caramoor’s beloved alums, arrived in an all-white piece of wearable sculpture and was immediately dubbed one of the best-dressed by Esquire magazine. Like Lucie Rosen, Batiste understands the perks of not being a wallflower.

“Rosen House Focus Tour: Inside Lucie’s Wardrobe” continues through Aug. 2. Caramoor is located at 149 Girdle Ridge Road, Katonah. Visit caramoor.org/event/rosen-house-tour for more information.