Page 170 - Bespoke_the_chic_and_the_cool

IN THE 1930’S, became the signature features of his style at that moved away from the basic advertising drawings
FELLOWS time and they were to help him enormously in to much more detailed illustrations of fashion. In
REFOCUSED HIS securing jobs with a number of magazines that this genre he was to work for a number of ma-
APPROACH. HE specialized in satire. gazines such as Cosmopolitan, Vanity Fair, Vogue
MOVED AWAY Although it is true that his style was soon to and The American Magazine. Most critically he
FROM THE BASIC create a fair number of imitators, his instinctive worked also with both Apparel Arts and Esquire
ADVERTISING penchant for compositions that were off-balance magazines that were first published in 1931 and
DRAWINGS TO was to ensure that he kept several steps ahead in 1933 respectively. As a result of there being only
MUCH MORE terms of his special quality. He was ultimately to a small number of fashion artists who were male,
DETAILED
ILLUSTRATIONS OF bring in his first client Kelly-Springfield Tires as a there was always at least one full-page illustra-
FASHION. commercial undertaking. At this time advertising tion by Laurence Fellows to be found in virtually
was somewhat staid but nonetheless it was to every issue. Nowadays he is most celebrated for
give him the very opportunity he sought, namely his drawings from the 1930s, yet he was to per-
to bring together both his sophisticated style of severe with Apparel Arts right through the war
draftsmanship and his own brand of humour. So- years of the 1940’s.
metimes he was to steer very close to infringing Across time the way in which Fellows developed
on the regulations set against negative competi- his style is notable. Initially he focused predomi-
tive commercial advertising. nantly with the drawing as a whole rather than
In the 1930’s, Fellows refocused his approach. He the details. But when he changed his style across

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