Fashion historian & author

Rebecca C. Tuite

Rebecca C. Tuite is a fashion historian and writer. She is the author of 1950s in Vogue: The Jessica Daves Years, 1952-1962, published by Thames & Hudson. With exquisite illustrations and fascinating archival materials, 1950s in Vogue is the very first book to craft the comprehensive story of Daves’s time at the helm of U.S. Vogue, and has been reviewed and recommended by American Vogue, The Los Angeles Times, The Telegraph, Paris Vogue, and The New York Journal of Books. Rebecca is also the author of Seven Sisters Style: The All-American Preppy Look (Rizzoli), which has garnered press attention worldwide and been featured in publications including The Wall Street Journal, Paris Vogue, and Vanity Fair.

In addition to completing her doctoral dissertation, Fashion in LIFE Magazine, 1936-1972 (a landmark study of fashion reporting and fashion photography in the weekly photomagazine LIFE, with a particular focus on the fashion editorship of Sally Kirkland), Rebecca is currently writing the first book on the life and work of prolific fashion and interiors photographer, Karen Radkai. Starting her career at Harper’s Bazaar in the late 1940s, Radkai then joined U.S. Vogue in 1953 and worked prodigiously, shooting more than thirty covers and countless more features under the editorship of Jessica Daves. Radkai would later work for many publications, including Architectural Digest and Town & Country, while continuing to produce editorials for the world’s finest fashion magazines. With a unique ability to blend the creative with the commercial, Radkai produced photographs that remain an iconic element of midcentury Vogue and a major contribution to the landscape of twentieth-century fashion photography.

Rebecca has served as a fashion history consultant and expert for print articles and television segments for the BBC, DuJour, The Huffington Post, Racked, Bloomberg, The Business of Fashion, The Travel Channel and CNN, among others. Making fashion history both accessible and relevant, Rebecca can be relied upon to provide answers to such burning questions as: What do Britney Spears and Rory Gilmore of Gilmore Girls have in common? Why should blue and green never be seen? What are history’s most shocking style moments? She has also provided insight into, among other things, the history of the polo shirt, the history of sorority girl fashion in the U.S., the history of the bobble hat, the world of Tiffany & Co jewelry, Ralph Lauren’s fashion empire, the history of preppy and Ivy League clothing and its influence across the globe, and the continued allure of ladylike fashions from the 1950s.

Rebecca has been invited to speak on fashion history topics at such cultural and artistic institutions as the Fashion and Textile Museum (London, England), The Bata Shoe Museum (Toronto, Canada), 92nd Street Y (New York City), National Museum of Ireland (Dublin, Ireland), Phoenix Art Museum (for the Arizona Costume Institute), and the National Arts Club of New York City. 

Rebecca has also extensively written and presented on Sylvia Plath and fashion, and is regularly called upon for her film and costume history expertise, including penning entries for Bloomsbury’s Encyclopedia of Film and Television Costume (forthcoming).

Rebecca graduated from the University of Exeter (UK) with a First Class Honours degree in English, completing part of her undergraduate studies at Vassar College in New York. She also holds a Masters Degree in Fashion Journalism (Distinction Honours) from the University of the Arts – London College of Fashion. Currently, she is a doctoral candidate at the Bard Graduate Center and Gallery, working toward her PhD in Decorative Arts, Design History and Material Culture.

Rebecca is originally from Surrey, England and now lives in Los Angeles, CA with her husband, Alec Helm, daughter Olivia, and Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, Audrey.