The High Style of Dorothy Draper

Museum of the City of New York

For this retrospective of Dorothy Draper’s work, we used dramatic overscaling of Draper’s signature decorating techniques to convey her bold, brash, and sometimes grandiose style. In the rotunda, we exaggerated Draper’s “Manor Rose” wallpaper pattern—typically featuring a four-inch-wide rose—into gargantuan, four-foot-wide flowers that were a counterpoint to hand–painted white silhouettes of Draper’s plaster creations. The hallway framed a surprising vista of two pieces from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s former “Dorotheum” Café: an enormous, nine-foot-tall birdcage chandelier hanging above one of Draper’s large sculptural sofas. In the main gallery, an arcade of square-paneled, black-and-white Hampshire House doors—paired with oversized, black-and-white floor tiles in a forced perspective—recalled the grand, expansive spaces Draper frequently designed. Throughout the exhibition, we used the typeface “Mrs. Eaves” in black, white, and a dark “Draper” green. The playful elegance of the numerous typographic ligatures evoked Draper’s use of whimsical plaster shapes.

Curator: Donald Albrecht

"The exhibition beautifully captures her spirit, her exuberant approach, and her accomplishments. The designers themselves said it best: 'We intentionally resisted the temptation to recreate a Draper interior, choosing instead to offer glimpses of Draper's startling approach to color and scale.' ...It all makes for an informative, amusing, memorable, and engaging exhibit."

Society for Experiential Graphic Design

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