Sonja de Lennart facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Sonja de Lennart
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| Born | 21 May 1920 |
| Occupation | Fashion designer |
| Years active | 1945–present |
| Known for | Inventing capri pants |
Sonja de Lennart (born 21 May 1920) is a German fashion designer. In 1948, she invented capri pants.
Early life
Sonja de Lennart was born in Prussia in May 1920, into a multicultural family as the daughter of an industrialist and syndicus. In her youth, she was a keen athlete in swimming and track and field. By the age of eight, de Lennart had already won many swimming competitions. In 1932, she participated in the official National Youth Competitions as an athlete in track and field running the 100 m and 1000 m sprint. She was an active member of the Classic Theater Society along with being a talented student of the Breslau State Opera ballet whose teacher was the famous dancer and ballet master, Anna Capana.
After attending business college in Breslau, her dream of becoming a fashion designer became a passion. She studied design despite her father’s extremely strong opposition and threat of disinheritance. She secretly enrolled as a student apprentice at Erich Boehm Atelier and later at Herman Palm Atelier in Berlin in which she studied the skillful trade of tailoring and the customizing of garments – from elegant hats to evening gowns – until she became a master craftsman of her trade graduating as a textile engineer. After World War II, she was entered as a member into the prestigious Handwerksrolle of the Chamber of Trade. After the political regime had destroyed the family fortune, it was de Lennart who, after World War II, restored her family financially with her fashion design trade.
Fashion career
In 1945, after the war, Sonja de Lennart began to produce fashion wear and opened her first boutique, Salon Sonja, in Munich. In the beginning she would cut piece of paper to demonstrate the fit of clothing on her customers.
Her design collection was named the Capri Collection after the Island of Capri that was important to the designer.
de Lennart first made Capri pants in the late 1940s and the actresses Mady Rahl and Erni Mangold wore them in 1949. The Capri pant had a short slit on the outer-side of the pant leg, and they started to become popular in 1954 when Audrey Hepburn wore them in the movie A Heart and a Crown.
In 1952, Edith Head used de Lennart's Capri Collection including a skirt, a high-neck blouse, and Capri pants for Audrey Hepburn in the movie, Roman Holiday.
