“Fashion historian Rebecca Jumper Matheson’s new book, Artisans and Designers: American Fashion Through Elizabeth and William Phelps (Kent State University Press, 2025), is the first study of the work and lives of this couple. This book is a biography of William and Elizabeth Phelps as “artisans and designers” and businesspeople, told through the objects they created. They left behind no business nor personal archive—Matheson has had to dig far and wide to uncover the clues to their lives and work. The focus of her research and the start of each chapter are the objects: the leather bags and belts that brought them acclaim, and the ready-to-wear “Deep Country” clothes Elizabeth introduced in the 1950s.”—Sighs & Whispers

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