1886-1956
Fashion Entrepreneur

Fashion and Business Sense.

Hattie Carnegie, who first achieved prominence in American fashion during the 1920s, was known for both her sophisticated taste in women's clothing and her genius in business. Having little talent for drawing, cutting, or sewing, Carnegie was not a designer in the usual sense; she instead altered original fashions imported from France and directed and polished the work of her own design assistants to ensure understated elegance and excellent workmanship in the clothing she sold. Carnegie was reportedly the first American to produce both custom-made and ready-to-wear garments under a single label, and she was among the first to complement her clothing stores with separate millinery, jewelry, cosmetics, and perfume establishments, thereby creating a multimillon-dollar empire.

Early Life.

Born Henrietta Kanengeiser in a Vienna ghetto, Carnegie came with her family to Manhattan's Lower East Side when she was six...