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Julius Pollack Original - Ever heard of him? Also, fabric help :)

Discussion in 'PUBLIC Vintage Fashion - Ask Questions Get Answers' started by shinybrightskies, Aug 19, 2020.

  1. shinybrightskies

    shinybrightskies Registered Guest

    Hi Everyone... me again.. Has anyone ever heard of Julius Pollack? I am guessing he may have been an Australian dress designer in the 50's but I am not 100% sure. Also,I have been out of the vintage scene so long now I have forgotten the name of this fabric.. Can anyone help me with that? Thank you!
     

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    Metro Retro Vintage likes this.
  2. denisebrain

    denisebrain VFG Vice President Staff Member VFG Past President

    Is the fabric slubbed vertically? And then embroidered? I bet the fabric was used with the weft on the vertical. I'm sorry, I don't know the label.
     
  3. shinybrightskies

    shinybrightskies Registered Guest

    Hi Maggie! Thanks for responding :) TBH I am not sure.. I'm not super technical when it comes to fabric detailing. I did find a small content tag that says Rayon so I am assuming its a slubbed rayon with embroidery. Again, thank you for that!
     
  4. lkranieri

    lkranieri VFG Member

    I will see if I can find anything for you about Julius Pollack. Just to help direct my search, may I ask why you think he was an Australian designer?
     
    Vintagiality likes this.
  5. I have a Julius Pollack and I assume it was an Australian design house because I've had this dress for about 16 years and bought it from a woman who had bought it in the '80s and Melbourne (where I am) was the heart of the Australian fashion industry.

    Here is my dress, it's a favourite. It's been much loved and worn. I'd love to see a photo of your coat, shinybrightskies.

    [​IMG][​IMG]
     
  6. There's a local landmark: a Julius Pollack Pavilion in Toorak, perhaps he funded its installation? But it turns out that he was the mayor of Malvern 1970-72 so it might have been named for him out of respect.

    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited: Aug 26, 2021
  7. Okay, I think I've found out as much online as I can currently about Julius Pollack. The bad news is that I couldn't find out much about the fashion label. I suspect it was short-lived.

    I'm curious about the length of your coat, because during this period you can help date garments by the length. My dress is 46.5 inches long, which suggests a late '40s date. And the only other JP I found was one a vintage dealer listed on Facebook four years ago. Her dress looks late '40s to me, and the length was 46 inches. If your coat is similar, it may be that the business didn't flourish (there was a lot of competition in post-war Melbourne) and he turned to other endeavours.

    The only snippet I found about JP relating to fashion was a business listing in 1948 where he registered the name 'Julius Pollack Creations'. But he soon added other names: Fashion Weavers Ltd and Fashion Weavers Pty Ltd and then more that don't appear to be fashion-related, especially Julius Pollack Enterprises, but also Polco Investments and Domain Gate Pty Ltd. The businesses were finally voluntarily liquidated in 2001.

    Here's what I can tell you about Julius Pollack about the man:
    Born in 1904 in Belarus, he migrated to Australia and married Fay Frieze. They had two sons: Norman and Bruce. Frieze is a famous name in the Melbourne Jewish rag trade, because David Frieze ran 'Frieze' fashions and made trendy menswear, especially tailored suits, from the '60s to the '80s. There may be a family link.

    Anyway, Julius was a migrant success story: he became president of the Australian Amateur Fencing Federation and in 1963 was awarded an MBE: Member of the British Empire for his service. In 1966 he was elected to Malvern council and in 1970 (as mentioned above) became mayor, a position he held for two years.

    In 1991 he was again awarded, this time with an Order of Australia medal for service to local government and the community. He passed away two years later.

    If you wanted to find out more, I think the Malvern Historical Society would be a good place to start as JP had good roots in the area, and served the community for many decades.
     
    GemGem likes this.
  8. GemGem

    GemGem Registered Guest

    Nicole you are a genius! What a fantastic wealth of information for the OP. Amazing
     
  9. Vintagiality

    Vintagiality VFG Treasurer Staff Member

    Hmm interesting! I have researched Julius Pollack in the past and there definitely was one in New York too. I have a handful of ads from 1917-1921.
    Here is an example
    Julius Pollack 1920.JPG
     
    poppysvintageclothing likes this.
  10. Thank you! The master's degree is paying off at last :)
     
    GemGem likes this.
  11. Hi Victoria, yes I found material related to your Julius Pollack, there are a few in the US (most in fact). Mine seems to be the only one in Australia, the uncommon spelling making it easier to research.
     
  12. The Vintage Merchant

    The Vintage Merchant Administrator Staff Member

    would also love to see full photos of your garment, if you have some to share?
     
  13. bluevelvetvintage

    bluevelvetvintage VFG Member


    Love the print on this dress!
     
  14. Thanks Theresa, it's great isn't it? This is one of my favourite dresses, I use it a lot due to the great print. It's featured in my first book 'Love Vintage' and I often use it in parades and talks, usually when I want to talk about atomic prints. That's how I came upon this thread: I'm presenting an online lecture on '50s fashion on Monday and this dress is in it, so I thought I'd see if I could find out anything more about the designer.
     
  15. Kylie Virtue

    Kylie Virtue Registered Guest

    I’m in albury Wodonga and have this one :)
     

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  16. Kylie Virtue

    Kylie Virtue Registered Guest

     

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  17. Kylie Virtue

    Kylie Virtue Registered Guest

    I have this one in on the border at albury/Wodonga :)
     

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  18. Hi Kylie, how amazing that you have one too? Yours looks like a late '40s to early '50s dinner dress.

    After the comments in this thread I did a bit more research on the label and wrote a blog post that includes more info: you can see it here.

    Nicole
     
    The Vintage Merchant likes this.

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