By 1946, Dorothy Liebes had developed an extensive portfolio of residential clients in Hawaii, including the American Heiress Doris Duke and several prominent businessmen in Honolulu. [1] Liebes notes in her unpublished memoir that one major commission of the postwar period was her involvement with the American shipping company Matson, Inc. to create textiles for the redesign of The Royal Hawaiian Hotel and its accompanying passenger ship, SS Lurline (Figs. 1, 2). [2] Both the hotel and the ship were used by US Armed Forces during World War II and required a complete overhaul to repair and rejuvenate their interiors. [3] These two commercial projects garnered the Liebes studio an increased amount of public exposure and were an opportunity to create an overall aesthetic experience for passengers—beginning aboard the SS Lurline and continuing once guests arrived at The Royal Hawaiian Hotel in Waikiki.
Efforts were focused on making the five-day journey aboard the SS Lurline a luxurious phase of the vacation experience—the ship was to be as much a paradise as the final destination. [4] As the link between the mainland and Hawaii, the SS Lurline was transformed into a “floating resort” and according to a 1948 press release, vacation was to begin “the minute one steps aboard.” [5] The famed industrial designer Raymond Loewy (French-American, 1893–1986) designed the interiors of the SS Lurline, hiring the Liebes team to design a theater curtain for the dining salon and reed shades for the women’s lounge of the ship (Fig. 3). [6] The correspondence and documentation of Lurline’s theater curtain offers a unique glimpse into the design process within the Liebes studio. Initial sketches, some drawn by the studio employee Daren Pierce, outline the general design and color arrangement of the curtain (Figs. 4, 5). A note from Liebes herself—penned on stationery from The Gotham Hotel—suggests an asymmetrical design and although there are “no crayons” in the hotel, she indicates color placement with the shading of her ballpoint pen (Fig. 6). Another sketch, annotated by Marion Phal, includes technical notes about dimensions, yarns, and weave structures (Figs. 7, 8). Collaboration was essential to the Liebes studio and the contributions of a diverse group of weavers were critical to Liebes’s success.
Additionally, Liebes’s studio worked closely with Loewy develop a color palette for the Lurline comprised of chartreuse and sage green with accents of vermillion and gold (Fig. 9). This color combination was then used for Liebes’s textiles at The Royal Hawaiian Hotel—visually connecting the ship’s interior to the hotel by implementing similarly saturated hues. The postwar transformation of the hotel sought to modernize the space—adding contemporary essentials such as air conditioning to guest suites. Furthermore, design tastes had dramatically changed since the hotel’s opening in 1927 and a fresh set of colors and textures were required to rejuvenate the space. The hotel renovation was led by the San Francisco duo of architect Gardner A. Daily (American, 1895–1967) and interior designer Frances Adler Elkins (American, 1888–1953). Liebes was a frequent collaborator and close friend of Elkins—both designers worked with unexpected color combinations and often traveled abroad together to gather design inspiration. Elkins particularly favored Liebes’s handmade blinds and experimental use of materials in her textiles. [7] For the Oceanside Lobby of The Royal Hawaiian, the Liebes studio created reed blinds in a coral hue with metallic accents, drawing direct inspiration from the Lurline’s color palette (Figs. 10, 11 & 12). Additionally, the hotel’s renovated restaurant—an expansive room with views of the Pacific—required Liebes’s blinds to fashionably filter the tropical sun (Figs. 13–17). In order to produce window treatments at such a large scale, the Liebes studio weavers worked in tandem on a single loom using bamboo reeds with accents of chartreuse and metallic threads. The selected materials and colors for both hotel spaces coordinated with the Lurline’s interiors—extending the aesthetic experience from the sea onto dry land.
At this point in Liebes’s career, she and Elkins had collaborated on various residential interiors in Los Angeles and the Bay area, but The Royal Hawaiian Hotel was an important public commission for them both. In Liebes’s unpublished memoir, she emphasizes the importance of hotel contracts to designers, stating, “hotels are among the principal pace-setters of public taste in color and design and every designer hopes he can play a part in raising levels of public taste.” [8] This commission is a remarkable example of Liebes’s textiles within a public interior that thoughtfully engage with both the architecture and the views of Waikiki. The Royal Hawaiian and SS Lurline commissions establish the powerful influence Liebes had on American design. Additionally, these projects highlight the collaborative process of the Liebes studio, display Liebes’s informed intentionality with an overall aesthetic experience, and show the far-reaching desire for her textiles—spanning from the mainland to the warm shores of Waikiki.
This research was made possible with major support from the Smithsonian American Women’s History Initiative.
NOTES
[1] In the late nineteenth century, the American shipping company Matson, Inc. began to transport sugar from Hawaii to the mainland of the United States. However, as Americans started to experience economic prosperity following World War I, they desired to visit the tropical islands and Matson realized their ships could be transporting more than just sugar to the desirable destination. Hawaii’s surge in popularity meant two things to Matson—wealthy Americans wanted to travel to the islands in style and upon arrival, they would need an opulent place to stay. Therefore, the shipping company built a fleet of grand ships (one being the SS Lurline) and constructed The Royal Hawaiian Hotel on the shores of Waikiki. Launching in 1927, Matson’s passenger ships operated in tandem with the hotel to create the ideal travel experience for American tourists. In 1946, Hawaii was a territory of the United States and the journey to reach the remote location from California took five days by boat. Thanks to Kehaulani Kam, Director of Cultural Services at The Royal Hawaiian Hotel and Lynn Krantz of Matson Inc. Archives for providing contextual information for this article.
[2] Liebes, autobiography outline and notes, 1. Series 4, Box 4, Folder 16, Dorothy Liebes Papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC.
[3] Stan Cohen and Camilla Carboni. “The Royal Hawaiian at War.” The Pink Palace of the Pacific: The Royal Hawaiian, a Luxury Collection Resort. (Missoula, MT: Pictorial Histories Publishing Co., Inc., 2011), 60-74.
[4] Lynn Blocker-Krantz. To Honolulu in Five Days: Cruising Aboard Matson’s S.S. Lurline. (Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 2001).
[5] Pamphlet, 1947. John Haskell Kemble Collection. The Huntington Library.
[6] Raymond Loewy was also hired by Matson Inc. to design the ticketing offices for passengers traveling abord the SS Lurline—further expanding the cohesively designed experience for tourists.
[7] John Stuart Gordon. “Curtain Walls: Dorothy Liebes and the Modern Interior.” A Dark, A Light, A Bright: The Designs of Dorothy Liebes (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2023) 24.
[8] Liebes, autobiography (ms.), 231. Series 4, Box 4, Folder 10, Dorothy Liebes Papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC.
