Nudie Cohn
Encyclopedia
Nudie Cohn was a Russia
n-born American
tailor
who designed decorative rhinestone
-covered suits, known popularly as "Nudie Suits", and other elaborate outfits for some of the most famous celebrities of his era. He also became famous for his outrageous customized automobiles.
. To escape the pogroms
of Czarist Russia his parents sent him at age 11, with his brother, Julius, to America. For a time he criss-crossed the country working as a shoeshine boy and later a boxer, and hung out, he later claimed, with the gangster Pretty Boy Floyd
. While living in a boardinghouse in Minnesota he met Helen "Bobbie" Kruger
, and married her in 1934. In the midst of the Great Depression
the newlyweds moved to New York City
and opened their first store, "Nudie's for the Ladies", specializing in custom-made undergarment
s for showgirl
s.
to buy him a sewing machine with the proceeds of an auctioned horse. In exchange, Cohn made clothing for Williams. As their creations gained a following, the Cohns opened "Nudie's of Hollywood" on the corner of Victory and Vineland in North Hollywood, dealing exclusively in western wear
, a style very much in fashion at the time. Nudie's designs brought the already-flamboyant style to a new level of ostentation with the liberal use of rhinestones and themed images in chain stitch
embroidery
. One of his early designs, in 1962, for singer Porter Wagoner
, was a peach-colored suit featuring rhinestones, a covered wagon on the back, and wagon wheels on the legs. He offered the suit to Wagoner for free, confident that the popular performer (like Tex Williams) would serve as a billboard
for his clothing line. His confidence once again proved justified and the business grew rapidly. In 1963 the Cohns relocated to a larger North Hollywood facility, renamed "Nudie's Rodeo Tailors", on Lankershim Boulevard.
Many of Cohn's designs became signature looks for their owners. Among his most famous creations was Elvis Presley
's $10,000 gold lamé
suit, worn by the singer on the cover of his 50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong
album. He designed the iconic costume worn by Robert Redford
in the 1979 film Electric Horseman, which is now owned and exhibited by the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
in Oklahoma City
. He created Hank Williams' white cowboy suit with musical notations on the sleeves, and Gram Parsons
' infamous suit for the cover of the Flying Burrito Brothers' 1969 album The Gilded Palace of Sin
, featuring pills, poppies
, marijuana leaves, naked women, and a huge cross. Many of the film costumes worn by Roy Rogers
and Dale Evans
were Nudie designs. John Lennon
was a customer, as were John Wayne
, Gene Autry
, George Jones
, Cher
, Ronald Reagan
, Elton John
, Robert Mitchum
, Pat Buttram
, Tony Curtis
, Michael Landon
, Glenn Campbell
, Hank Snow
, and numerous musical groups, notably America
and Chicago
. The members of ZZ Top
sported "Nudie Suits" on the cover photo of their 1975 album Fandango!
In 2006 Porter Wagoner said he had accumulated 52 Nudie Suits, costing between $11,000 and $18,000 each, since receiving his first free outfit in 1962. The European entertainer Bobbejaan Schoepen
was a client and personal friend; his collection of 35 complete stage outfits is the largest in Europe.
Nudie strutted around town in his own outrageous suits and rhinestone-studded cowboy hats. His sartorial trademark was mismatched boots, which he wore, he said, to remember his humble beginnings in the 1930s when he could not afford a matching pair of shoes. He shamelessly promoted himself and his products throughout his career. According to his granddaughter, Jamie Lee Nudie (a self-promoter in her own right who changed her last name to her grandfather's first name), he would often pay for items with dollar bills sporting a sticker of his face covering George Washington's. "When you get sick of looking at me," he would say, "just rip [the sticker] off and spend it."
convertibles, with silver-dollar-studded dashboards, pistol
door handles and gearshifts, extended rear bumpers, and enormous longhorn steer
horn hood ornaments. They were nicknamed "Nudie Mobiles
", and the nine surviving cars have become valued collector's items. A Bonneville convertible designed for country singer Webb Pierce
is on display at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
in Nashville, Tennessee
. A Pontiac Grandville convertible customized by Nudie can be seen at the end of the 1988 Buck Owens
/Dwight Yoakam
music video, "The Streets of Bakersfield." That same car—which Owens' manager claims was originally built for Elvis Presley—now hangs over the bar inside Buck Owens
' Crystal Palace in Bakersfield, California
. Two cars were purchased by Schoepen and remain on display at Bobbejaanland
, a Western-themed amusement park near Brussels
.
Cohn's creations, particularly those with celebrity provenance, remain popular with Country/Western and show business collectors, and continue to command high prices when they come on the market. In December 2009, for example, a white Nudie stage shirt owned by Roy Rogers, decorated with blue tassels and red musical notes, sold for $16,250 at a Christie's
auction.
A large collection of Nudie outfits, accessories, and ephemera from the collection of Bobbejaan Schoepen, the Belgian entertainer, are currently on exhibit in Antwerp through February 2012 at the MoMu Fashion Gallery.
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n-born American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
tailor
Tailor
A tailor is a person who makes, repairs, or alters clothing professionally, especially suits and men's clothing.Although the term dates to the thirteenth century, tailor took on its modern sense in the late eighteenth century, and now refers to makers of men's and women's suits, coats, trousers,...
who designed decorative rhinestone
Rhinestone
A rhinestone or paste or diamante is a diamond simulant made from rock crystal, glass or acrylic.Originally, rhinestones were rock crystals gathered from the river Rhine. The availability was greatly increased around 1775 when the Alsatian jeweller Georg Friedrich Strass had the idea to imitate...
-covered suits, known popularly as "Nudie Suits", and other elaborate outfits for some of the most famous celebrities of his era. He also became famous for his outrageous customized automobiles.
Early life
Cohn was born Nuta Kotlyarenko in KievKiev
Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....
. To escape the pogroms
Pogroms in Ukraine
It is estimated that one third of Europe's Jews lived in Ukraine, which from 1791 to 1917 partly belonged to the Pale of Settlement. The concentration of Jews in this region made them an easy target for pogroms and massive, anti-Jewish riots.-During Czarist Russia:...
of Czarist Russia his parents sent him at age 11, with his brother, Julius, to America. For a time he criss-crossed the country working as a shoeshine boy and later a boxer, and hung out, he later claimed, with the gangster Pretty Boy Floyd
Pretty Boy Floyd
Charles Arthur "Pretty Boy" Floyd was an American bank robber. He operated in the West South Central States, and his criminal exploits gained heavy press coverage in the 1930s. Like most other prominent outlaws of that era, he was killed by law enforcement officers...
. While living in a boardinghouse in Minnesota he met Helen "Bobbie" Kruger
Helen Barbara Kruger
Helen Barbara Kruger also known as Bobbie Nudie, was born in Mankato, Minnesota.She met her future husband Nudie Cohn at her parent's boarding house...
, and married her in 1934. In the midst of the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
the newlyweds moved to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and opened their first store, "Nudie's for the Ladies", specializing in custom-made undergarment
Undergarment
Undergarments or underwear are clothes worn under other clothes, often next to the skin. They keep outer garments from being soiled by bodily secretions and discharges, shape the body, and provide support for parts of it. In cold weather, long underwear is sometimes worn to provide additional...
s for showgirl
Showgirl
A showgirl is a dancer or performer in a stage entertainment show. Showgirl is also often used as a term for a promotional model in trade fairs and car shows, etc...
s.
Clothing business
Relocating to California in the early 1940s, Nudie and Bobbie began designing and manufacturing clothing in their garage. In 1947 Cohn persuaded a young, struggling country singer named Tex WilliamsTex Williams
Sollie Paul Williams , known professionally as Tex Williams, was an American Western swing musician from Ramsey, Illinois....
to buy him a sewing machine with the proceeds of an auctioned horse. In exchange, Cohn made clothing for Williams. As their creations gained a following, the Cohns opened "Nudie's of Hollywood" on the corner of Victory and Vineland in North Hollywood, dealing exclusively in western wear
Western wear
Western wear is a category of men's and women's clothing which derives its unique style from the clothes worn in the 19th-century American West. It ranges from accurate historical reproductions of pioneer, mountain man, Civil War, cowboy and vaquero clothing to the stylized garments popularized by...
, a style very much in fashion at the time. Nudie's designs brought the already-flamboyant style to a new level of ostentation with the liberal use of rhinestones and themed images in chain stitch
Chain stitch
Chain stitch is a sewing and embroidery technique in which a series of looped stitches form a chain-like pattern. Chain stitch is an ancient craft - examples of surviving Chinese chain stitch embroidery worked in silk thread have been dated to the Warring States period...
embroidery
Embroidery
Embroidery is the art or handicraft of decorating fabric or other materials with needle and thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as metal strips, pearls, beads, quills, and sequins....
. One of his early designs, in 1962, for singer Porter Wagoner
Porter Wagoner
Porter Wayne Wagoner was a popular American country music singer known for his flashy Nudie and Manuel suits and blond pompadour. He introduced the young Dolly Parton near the beginning of her career on his long-running television show, and they were a well-known duet throughout the late 1960s and...
, was a peach-colored suit featuring rhinestones, a covered wagon on the back, and wagon wheels on the legs. He offered the suit to Wagoner for free, confident that the popular performer (like Tex Williams) would serve as a billboard
Billboard (advertising)
A billboard is a large outdoor advertising structure , typically found in high traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertisements to passing pedestrians and drivers...
for his clothing line. His confidence once again proved justified and the business grew rapidly. In 1963 the Cohns relocated to a larger North Hollywood facility, renamed "Nudie's Rodeo Tailors", on Lankershim Boulevard.
Many of Cohn's designs became signature looks for their owners. Among his most famous creations was Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
's $10,000 gold lamé
Lamé (fabric)
Lamé is a type of fabric woven or knit with thin ribbons of metallic yarns, as opposed to guimpé, where the ribbons are wrapped around a fibre yarn. It is usually gold or silver in color; sometimes copper lamé is seen. Lamé comes in different varieties, depending on the composition of the other...
suit, worn by the singer on the cover of his 50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong
50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong
50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong: Elvis' Gold Records - Volume 2 is the ninth album by Elvis Presley, issued on RCA Victor Records in November 1959. It is a compilation of hit singles released in 1958 and 1959 by Presley, from two recording sessions in June 1958 at RCA Studios in Nashville and...
album. He designed the iconic costume worn by Robert Redford
Robert Redford
Charles Robert Redford, Jr. , better known as Robert Redford, is an American actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist, and founder of the Sundance Film Festival. He has received two Oscars: one in 1981 for directing Ordinary People, and one for Lifetime...
in the 1979 film Electric Horseman, which is now owned and exhibited by the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
The National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum is a museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, with more than 28,000 Western and American Indian art works and artifacts. The facility also has the world's most extensive collection of American rodeo, photographs, barbed wire, saddlery, and early rodeo trophies...
in Oklahoma City
Oklahoma city
Oklahoma City is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma.Oklahoma City may also refer to:*Oklahoma City metropolitan area*Downtown Oklahoma City*Uptown Oklahoma City*Oklahoma City bombing*Oklahoma City National Memorial...
. He created Hank Williams' white cowboy suit with musical notations on the sleeves, and Gram Parsons
Gram Parsons
Gram Parsons was an American singer, songwriter, guitarist and pianist. Parsons is best known for his work within the country genre; he also mixed blues, folk, and rock to create what he called "Cosmic American Music"...
' infamous suit for the cover of the Flying Burrito Brothers' 1969 album The Gilded Palace of Sin
The Gilded Palace of Sin
The Gilded Palace of Sin is an album by the country rock group The Flying Burrito Brothers, released in 1969. It continued Gram Parsons' and Chris Hillman's pioneering work in modern country music, fusing traditional sources like folk and country with other forms of popular music like gospel, soul,...
, featuring pills, poppies
Opium poppy
Opium poppy, Papaver somniferum, is the species of plant from which opium and poppy seeds are extracted. Opium is the source of many opiates, including morphine , thebaine, codeine, papaverine, and noscapine...
, marijuana leaves, naked women, and a huge cross. Many of the film costumes worn by Roy Rogers
Roy Rogers
Roy Rogers, born Leonard Franklin Slye , was an American singer and cowboy actor, one of the most heavily marketed and merchandised stars of his era, as well as being the namesake of the Roy Rogers Restaurants franchised chain...
and Dale Evans
Dale Evans
Dale Evans, was an American writer, movie star, and singer-songwriter. She was the third wife of singing cowboy Roy Rogers.-Early life:...
were Nudie designs. John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
was a customer, as were John Wayne
John Wayne
Marion Mitchell Morrison , better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. He epitomized rugged masculinity and became an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height...
, Gene Autry
Gene Autry
Orvon Grover Autry , better known as Gene Autry, was an American performer who gained fame as The Singing Cowboy on the radio, in movies and on television for more than three decades beginning in the 1930s...
, George Jones
George Jones
George Glenn Jones is an American country music singer known for his long list of hit records, his distinctive voice and phrasing, and his marriage to Tammy Wynette....
, Cher
Cher
Cher is an American recording artist, television personality, actress, director, record producer and philanthropist. Referred to as the Goddess of Pop, she has won an Academy Award, a Grammy Award, an Emmy Award, three Golden Globes and a Cannes Film Festival Award among others for her work in...
, Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
, Elton John
Elton John
Sir Elton Hercules John, CBE, Hon DMus is an English rock singer-songwriter, composer, pianist and occasional actor...
, Robert Mitchum
Robert Mitchum
Robert Charles Durman Mitchum was an American film actor, author, composer and singer and is #23 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest male American screen legends of all time...
, Pat Buttram
Pat Buttram
Maxwell Emmett "Pat" Buttram was an American actor, known for playing the sidekick of Gene Autry and for playing the character of Mr. Haney in the TV series Green Acres. He had a distinctive voice which, in his own words, "... never quite made it through puberty"...
, Tony Curtis
Tony Curtis
Tony Curtis was an American film actor whose career spanned six decades, but had his greatest popularity during the 1950s and early 1960s. He acted in over 100 films in roles covering a wide range of genres, from light comedy to serious drama...
, Michael Landon
Michael Landon
Michael Landon was an American actor, writer, director, and producer. He is widely known for his roles as Little Joe Cartwright in Bonanza , Charles Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie , and Jonathan Smith in Highway to Heaven...
, Glenn Campbell
Glenn Campbell
Glen Campbell may refer to:People:* Glen Campbell , American musician -- country, active in US* Glenn Ross Campbell , American musician -- rock, active in UK* Glenn Campbell , Scottish journalist...
, Hank Snow
Hank Snow
Clarence Eugene "Hank" Snow was a Canadian-American country music artist. He charted more than 70 singles on the Billboard country charts from 1950 until 1980...
, and numerous musical groups, notably America
America (band)
America is an English-American folk rock band that originally included members Gerry Beckley, Dewey Bunnell and Dan Peek. The three members were barely out of their teens when they became a musical sensation during 1972, scoring #1 hits and winning a Grammy for best new musical artist...
and Chicago
Chicago (band)
Chicago is an American rock band formed in 1967 in Chicago, Illinois. The self-described "rock and roll band with horns" began as a politically charged, sometimes experimental, rock band and later moved to a predominantly softer sound, becoming famous for producing a number of hit ballads. They had...
. The members of ZZ Top
ZZ Top
ZZ Top is an American rock band, sometimes referred to as "That Little Ol' Band from Texas". Their style, which is rooted in blues-based boogie rock, has come to incorporate elements of arena, southern, and boogie rock. The band, from Houston Texas, formed in 1969...
sported "Nudie Suits" on the cover photo of their 1975 album Fandango!
Fandango!
Fandango! is the fourth album by American blues rock band ZZ Top, released in 1975. Half the cuts are selections from live shows, the other half are new songs from the studio...
In 2006 Porter Wagoner said he had accumulated 52 Nudie Suits, costing between $11,000 and $18,000 each, since receiving his first free outfit in 1962. The European entertainer Bobbejaan Schoepen
Bobbejaan Schoepen
Bobbejaan Schoepen is a pseudonym of Modest Schoepen was a Flemish pioneer in Belgian pop music, vaudeville, and European country music...
was a client and personal friend; his collection of 35 complete stage outfits is the largest in Europe.
Nudie strutted around town in his own outrageous suits and rhinestone-studded cowboy hats. His sartorial trademark was mismatched boots, which he wore, he said, to remember his humble beginnings in the 1930s when he could not afford a matching pair of shoes. He shamelessly promoted himself and his products throughout his career. According to his granddaughter, Jamie Lee Nudie (a self-promoter in her own right who changed her last name to her grandfather's first name), he would often pay for items with dollar bills sporting a sticker of his face covering George Washington's. "When you get sick of looking at me," he would say, "just rip [the sticker] off and spend it."
Automobiles
Cohn was equally famous for his garishly-decorated automobiles. Between 1950 and 1975 he customized 18 vehicles, mostly white Pontiac BonnevillePontiac Bonneville
The Pontiac Bonneville was an automobile built by the Pontiac division of General Motors from 1957 to 2005. It was introduced as a limited production performance convertible during the 1957 model year...
convertibles, with silver-dollar-studded dashboards, pistol
Handgun
A handgun is a firearm designed to be held and operated by one hand. This characteristic differentiates handguns as a general class of firearms from long guns such as rifles and shotguns ....
door handles and gearshifts, extended rear bumpers, and enormous longhorn steer
Longhorn cattle
Longhorn cattle are a long-horned brown and white breed of beef cattle originating from Craven in the north of England. They have a white patch along the line of their spine and under their bellies....
horn hood ornaments. They were nicknamed "Nudie Mobiles
Nudie Mobiles
-History:Nudie was a Ukrainian-American tailor, known for designing rhinestone-covered outfits worn by celebrities as Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. Between 1950 and 1975 he customized 18 Cadillac and Pontiac convertibles with typical Nudie icons, such a silver-dollar-studded dashboards, pistol...
", and the nine surviving cars have become valued collector's items. A Bonneville convertible designed for country singer Webb Pierce
Webb Pierce
Webb Michael Pierce was one of the most popular American honky tonk vocalists of the 1950s, charting more number one hits than any other country artist during the decade. His biggest hit was "In The Jailhouse Now," which charted for 37 weeks in 1955, 21 of them at number one...
is on display at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum
The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum identifies and preserves the evolving history and traditions of country music and educates its audiences...
in Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
. A Pontiac Grandville convertible customized by Nudie can be seen at the end of the 1988 Buck Owens
Buck Owens
Alvis Edgar Owens, Jr. , better known as Buck Owens, was an American singer and guitarist who had 21 No. 1 hits on the Billboard country music charts with his band, the Buckaroos...
/Dwight Yoakam
Dwight Yoakam
Dwight David Yoakam is an American singer-songwriter, actor and film director, most famous for his pioneering country music...
music video, "The Streets of Bakersfield." That same car—which Owens' manager claims was originally built for Elvis Presley—now hangs over the bar inside Buck Owens
Buck Owens
Alvis Edgar Owens, Jr. , better known as Buck Owens, was an American singer and guitarist who had 21 No. 1 hits on the Billboard country music charts with his band, the Buckaroos...
' Crystal Palace in Bakersfield, California
Bakersfield, California
Bakersfield is a city near the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley in Kern County, California. It is roughly equidistant between Fresno and Los Angeles, to the north and south respectively....
. Two cars were purchased by Schoepen and remain on display at Bobbejaanland
Bobbejaanland
Bobbejaanland is a renowned theme park in Lichtaart, Belgium. It was founded by Bobbejaan Schoepen, a Flemish singer, guitarist, and entertainer who enjoyed international popularity in the fifties and early sixties. After 15 years he got weary of touring. In 1960 he decided to build his own music...
, a Western-themed amusement park near Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
.
Death and legacy
Nudie Cohn died in 1984 at the age of 81. Numerous celebrities and long-time customers attended his funeral. The eulogy was delivered by Dale Evans. Nudie's Rodeo Tailor remained open for an additional ten years under the ownership of Nudie's widow Bobbie and granddaughter Jamie, and closed in 1994.Cohn's creations, particularly those with celebrity provenance, remain popular with Country/Western and show business collectors, and continue to command high prices when they come on the market. In December 2009, for example, a white Nudie stage shirt owned by Roy Rogers, decorated with blue tassels and red musical notes, sold for $16,250 at a Christie's
Christie's
Christie's is an art business and a fine arts auction house.- History :The official company literature states that founder James Christie conducted the first sale in London, England, on 5 December 1766, and the earliest auction catalogue the company retains is from December 1766...
auction.
A large collection of Nudie outfits, accessories, and ephemera from the collection of Bobbejaan Schoepen, the Belgian entertainer, are currently on exhibit in Antwerp through February 2012 at the MoMu Fashion Gallery.
External links
- Nudie's Rodeo Tailors official site
- Made In Hollywood: A Tribute to Nudie - fashion film featuring Nicky Panicci
- Picture of Nudie with Elvis
- Nudie's Rodeo Tailors Archive at the Autry National Center
