Ebony Celebrates 50 Years of the Fashion Fair

The Chicago History Museum’s newest exhibition, “Inspiring Beauty: 50 Years of Ebony Fashion Fair,” celebrates Ebony’s history in the fashion world.

The Ebony Fashion Fair allowed black Americans to be exposed to the latest high fashion designs of the world during the 1950’s and 60’s.

Eunice W. Johnson, wife of John Johnson and head of Johnson Publishing Company, traveled the world to search for the most cutting edge fashions to display at the Fashion Fair.

“On the runways, what you saw was her vision of

what was fashionable and what was stylish,” said Joy Bivins, curator, to TheGrio. “In the late 1950s, when these black people showed up in Europe to purchase these garments, it wasn’t always an easy thing to get their foot in the door. They didn’t have the history, they didn’t know who we were, what Ebony was.”