In 1942, after witnessing a dance performance by Martha Graham, Gernreich eschewed his art studies at the Los Angeles City College to devote himself to dance. Though Gernreich studied art and apprenticed at a clothing manufacturer, he grew increasingly disillusioned with the world of fashion. The family settled in Los Angeles where 16-year-old Gernreich found a job washing bodies at a hospital morgue. In 1938 Gernreich and his mother fled from Austria as Jewish refugees when the Nazis annexed the country.

Growing up in Vienna, Austria, Gernreich spent much of his young life in the salon of his aunt’s dress shop, learning about fabrics and sketching designs for the clientele. Rudi Gernreich’s fashion instinct came naturally. While his name is unknown by many today, he was-in his time-not only a media darling who created some of the most well-known styles of the 1960s, but a pioneering designer who changed the fashion landscape for decades to come. His prophetic fashion statements earned him the title of “the most way-out, far-ahead designer in the US” in his Time article. While designers such as Andre Courrèges and Paco Rabanne were inspired by a space-age view of the future, creating designs that incorporated spacey influences like vinyl boots, silver lamé, and astronaut-helmet-like hats, Gernreich was more inspired by a future that included true equality between men and women. Rudi Gernreich’s Time cover, December 1967.

60s space age fashion