Style Icon: Dovima

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Discovered in the streets of New York, her hometown, Dovima's overnight success brought her to be one of the highest paid models of the fifties. Dovima was transformed into the face of haute couture in the 1950s, what Christian Dior called the "New Look". Famous photographer, Richard Aveedon, described Dovima as "the last of the great elegant, aristocratic beauties...the most remarkable and unconventional beauty of her time." She appeared on the cover of all the major fashion magazines, working with many of the major photographers of her time. Dovima and Aveedon's "Dovima with Elephants" became one of the most famous fashion pictures of all time and can be found in museums such as the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum.

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"The ideal of beauty then was the opposite of what it is now. It stood for an extension of the aristocratic view of women as ideals, of women as dreams, of women as almost surreal objects. Dovima fit that in her proportions."

-Richard Aveedon