Dolly Tree (1899-1962) was an industrious, glamorous and talented illustrator and costume designer who forged a successful career against all odds during the 1920's and 1930's in London, Paris, New York and Hollywood. A prime example of the new modern working woman. Although her name has largely been forgotten her artistic flair touched so many stage and screen personalities that even if you have never heard of her before you will be familiar with her stylish creations for such movie stars as Myrna Loy, Jean Harlow and Judy Garland and other MGM starlets. She was also responsible for creating the quintessential 1890's look for Mae West which made her famous and it is believed that she was one of the first designers to propogate the use of the strapless evening gown. Dolly Tree's creative genius had a profound impact on fashion and her modern approach to dress designing with its chic air of simplicity has given her creations a timeless quality that can be glimpsed at in modern couture.

Dolly Tree was one of the many talented and prolific designers during what has been called the 'golden age' of creativity during the 1920's and1930's. She had an international reputation as a prolific costume designer for stage and screen with her exotic creations appearing in revues, musicals, pantomimes and cabaret in London, Paris and New York during the1920's and in some of Hollywood's most prestigious films made by MGM in the 1930's where she maintained the style and glamour of costume for which MGM was famous. It is very much because of her diverse career and her versatility as a designer for all forms of entertainment on both sides of the Atlantic that makes her work so fascinating. Also, through her career we can glimpse the splendour and originality of design for the theatre during the gay twenties and the glamour and style of Hollywood during the thirties.

Unlike many of her contemporaries who adopted the concept of art deco whole heartedly and rarely departed from the premise of that style - and were incidentally largely men - Dolly Tree expressed a much more varied vision drawing on inspiration from every conceivable art movement of the time. As a result her style was completely modern in approach, illustrated a very vivid imagination, adopted the desire for a greater freedom of feminine movement and independence that was reflective of the concept of the new woman and stressed the Parisienne outlook of simplicity. Her showgirl costumes were exotic and bizarre and sometimes used bold splashes of colour and yet her philosophy for her contemporary gowns maintained her fondness for simplicity of line and decoration with the emphasis on unusual detail, which included the strapless evening gown which she may well have developed in the late 1920's. Throughout the twenty or so years of her working career as a designer she maintained a unique and innovative style which had amajor influence on contemporary culture. Considerable misinformation still surrounds Dolly Tree and stems from the fact that she was a woman and also because she was not assertive about her own publicity. These two factors help explain why her work and achievements have been forgotten and why she faltered in later life. She had a nervous disposition and as her career progressed the tensions in her life grew. She was unable to capitalise on her success and became overshadowed by those that could and eventually tried to alleviate her anxiety by drinking heavily which ultimately led to her demise.

Over the years Dolly Tree has been constantly overshadowed by her male contemporaries who took the limelight away from her. At the Folies Bergere in Paris her work has been eclipsed by the towering edifice of Erte's shrewd self publicity. In New York, Charles LeMaire's status and self importance obscured her Broadway credits and in Hollywood the excellence of MGM's publicity machine has relegated her to a position of relative unimportance at the expense of glittering praise for Adrian. There is no balance and no objective analysis of the truth. And this was by no means something that was solely confined to Dolly Tree as many of her female colleagues faced a similar erosion of their legacies. My aim is to explore, illuminate and eradicate some of the accumulated distortions of reality and create a more balanced perspective and place Dolly Tree more visibly in the limelight to receive the recognition that she so richly deserves. It can only be hoped that research into the work of all designers from this fascinating and productive period will continue and that more material will come to light and be saved for posterity.