Mannequins of our Times

NEW YORK, Aug 17, 1999/ FW/ --- Since 1959, nearly 40 years ago, Adel Rootstein and Co. has been bringing to life mannequins based on actual people rather than stiff lifeless-looking models of the past.

"The idea of bringing to life the fashion models from the magazines was Adel's ground-breaking idea" says Kevin Arpino, the Creative Director who is based in London and has worked for the company for 16 years. He took over when Adel died a few years ago.

When Adel Rootstein first arrived in London from her native Johannesburg suburb in South Africa, before she became a successful window dresser at London's upscale Aquascutum, she made wigs in her basement flat in Earls Court. Working from the premise that mannequins were too old to display the new hot clothes of the day, she set to designing a one or two modern figures with a sculptor she met, John Taylor (who still sculpts for the company today) and business began to grow.

"Out-dated fifties mannequins looked the wrong age and the wrong shape modeling the new Mary Quant mini-skirts" says Arpino. "Adel came up with figures of Patty Boyd, Sandy Shaw but she was most famous for the mannequins of Twiggy which were produced concurrently with the swinging 60's Kings Road era in London. In fact, she chose Twiggy before she really became the name of the decade."

It was around 1964 that Adel launched 6 different Twiggy poses based on the supermodel who aged only 14 at the time which scored big hit in New York. From that success she opened the New York office and a factory in Brooklyn where all the mannequins are produced today.

The most recent figures to be sculpted by John Taylor are those of Jody Kidd and Karen Mulder. But he has fashioned mannequins through the decades to include an incredible celebrity line-up of Marie Helvin, Joanna Lumley (Patsy from Absolutely Fabulous) as well as Joan Collins - before and during the Dynasty years.

The company bring out a collection twice a year like a normal fashion house would, but mannequin lines take up to 18 months to produce so there is lots of thinking ahead with respect to trends. "Sometimes the lines are fashion oriented and sometimes lifestyle oriented," says Arpino.

Adel Roostein sell internationally through a network of 30 agents worldwide and have showrooms in New York and San Francisco and their models are also licensed for Japan.

Their newest product, a line of 12 figures of which 9 were ethnic mixes, received a good reaction it the USA but less so in the United Kingdom. "This was something that we felt we had to produce because it was right," says Arpino. "You hardly open a fashion magazine and not see a stunning black or mixed-race face and our mannequins needed to reflect that. Sometimes we are more advanced than our customers are, and it takes a few months to excite them with new products. They always catch on in the end!"

It is not surprising that such a long-standing bastion of the Mannequin industry design both realistic and stylized figures for fashion giants like Ralph Lauren Polo and Zara and that their models are in demand at New York Institutions Saks 5th Avenue, Bergdorff Goodman, Bloomingdales, Barneys and Neiman Marcus.

Website: www.rootstein.com

Adel Rootstein Mannequins

Adel Rootstein Mannequins

Adel Rootstein Mannequins

Adel Rootstein Mannequins