Ann Lowe was a fashion icon and African American fashion designer who in 1953 designed Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis' wedding dress for her marriage to John F. Kennedy. 

A trailblazer, Ms. Lowe opened “Ann Lowe Originals” inside the Saks Fifth Ave department store on Madison Avenue in New York in the 1960s and even appeared in one of their advertisements.  Ms. Lowe's talent and perseverance paved the way for fashion designers of color around the world.  Keep reading to learn more about fashion icon, Ms. Anne Lowe.

5 Facts About Ann Lowe

1.  Ms. Lowe was born in 1898 in Clayton, Alabama.  She was the great granddaughter of a slave and plantation owner.

2.  She got married in 1912, at age 14, and five years later moved to New York City where she enrolled in a fashion school in 1917.

3.  Shortly after graduation, Ms. Lowe opened a salon in Tampa, Florida.   In 1928, she moved back to New York in 1928 where she worked on commission for high-end luxury boutiques.

4.  In 1946, Ms. Lowe designed the dress that actress Olivia de Havilland wore to accept the Academy Award for Best Actress in the movie To Each His Own.

5.   Her work still lives on in the permanent archives at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Black Fashion Museum and The Smithsonian.  Ms. Lowe passed away in 1981 at age 83.

You can learn more about this African American fashion icon on her Wikipedia page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Lowe and in a 2013 Huffington Post article by clicking here.

Staff Blogger