Dolly Tree

Dolly Tree (1899-1962) had an international reputation as a designer for stage and screen costumes during the 1920's and 1930's in London, Paris, New York and Hollywood. She was England's leading stage designer during the 1920's and her ingenious costumes proliferated in major revues, musicals, pantomimes and cabaret in London and the regions. Dolly Tree was also involved in designing costumes for the British film industry and was allied to the couture house of Jean Peron. Her work also had a great vogue in Paris where she became the first English person and the first woman to design for the Folies Bergere. In New York in the late 1920's she became famous for creating the quintessensial 1890's look for Mae West and it is believed that she was one of the first designers to propogate the use of the strapless evening gown. Finally Dolly Tree became one of Hollywood's major screen designers, working for MGM during the 1930's. Here she maintained the style and glamour of costume for which MGM was famous, designing elegant creations for Myrna Loy, Jean Harlow, Rosalind Russell, Virginia Bruce and Judy Garland, besides the historical costumes for the classic David Selznick movies such as Viva Villa, David Copperfield and A Tale of Two Cities. Despite the excellence of her work and the broad scope of her achievements, misinformation in many forms surrounds Dolly Tree. She has been consistantly overshadowed by the accomplishments of others and as a result her work and achievements have been wrongly overlooked and ignored. For example, her work at the Folies Bergere in Paris has been eclipsed by the towering edifice of Erte's shrewd self publicity 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.