Preferred Citation:	Harry Ransom Center, The University of Texas at Austin. Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes Papers (Performing Arts Collection PA-00189).
	Acquisition:	Gift, 2004 (G 12485)
	Processed by:	Ancelyn Krivak, 2023

Repository:

Harry Ransom Center, The University of Texas at Austin

	Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes, born Elisabeth-Edith Charlotte Addams in Blankenberge, Belgium on August 1, 1907, was a costume designer and producer for theater, ballet, opera, film, and television. The daughter of a British father and a Belgian mother, Lutyens Bel Geddes attended schools in Belgium, England, and Germany. She and her sister Jenny Addams trained as competitive fencers and represented Belgium in the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam. In 1929 she married Archibald Charles Lutyens, a first cousin and nephew of architect Sir Edwin Lutyens, and settled in London, where she studied hat and clothing design. Lutyens Bel Geddes divorced her husband in 1939 on grounds of cruelty and supported herself through her design business and other jobs. In 1942, she left war-torn Britain for the United States on a commission to sell a sculpture by Jacob Epstein, and never returned.
	An opportunity to construct costumes for American Ballet Theatre’s production of Dim Lustre in 1943 (designed by a friend from England, Elizabeth Montgomery, under the name "Motley") developed into Lutyens Bel Geddes’s own theatrical costume business, located in New York City. The Edith Lutyens costume shop made costumes for Broadway plays and musicals (including the original production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible in 1953), ballets, and other performances. Lutyens Bel Geddes also worked as a producer, bringing the Gian Carlo Menotti operas The Medium and The Telephone to Broadway in 1947. She married Moseley Taylor, son of the publisher of the Boston Globe newspaper, in the 1940s, but the couple had separated by 1950, when she met theatrical and industrial designer Norman Bel Geddes at a party. Taylor died in 1952, while Lutyens Bel Geddes was in the process of trying to obtain a divorce. Following her third marriage to Norman Bel Geddes in 1954, she closed her costume shop to help with her husband’s daily business operations, while collaborating with him on various creative projects.
	The marriage with Norman Bel Geddes was harmonious but short-lived; he died of heart disease in 1958. Lutyens Bel Geddes arranged the sale of his papers to The University of Texas at Austin and restarted her costume business shortly after. She also attempted unsuccessfully to launch a theatrical production company, Bel Geddes Productions. Lutyens Bel Geddes designed costumes for plays and musicals on and off Broadway, ballet, modern dance, and opera through the 1960s and 1970s. She worked on several productions with African American directors, choreographers, and performers, including the musical Kicks & Co., Katherine Dunham’s adaptation of Charles Gounod’s opera Faust, and works by the Alvin Ailey Dance Theater and George Faison Ballet. Lutyens Bel Geddes designed costumes for at least one of Ballet Hispanico of New York’s productions and served as President of the company’s Board of Directors. She also claimed to have costumed Shirley MacLaine for Alfred Hitchcock’s The Trouble with Harry, even though Edith Head is the only costume designer credited for that film.
	In addition to her production design work, she was the author of Encyclopedia Britannica’s article on Costume Design and served from 1958-1960 as the publisher of Theatre Arts magazine. Lutyens Bel Geddes was a member of several trade unions, including the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) and United Scenic Artists. She was an avid traveler who escaped New York winters at various locations including Jamaica, Haiti, Spain, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Costa Rica, India, and Thailand.
	In the early 1980s, Lutyens Bel Geddes moved from New York City to Hudson, New York, where she began a new career as a real estate broker. She was an extremely accomplished home cook who regularly entertained guests at dinner parties, and the owner of many beloved small-breed dogs. Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes died on August 16, 2002, at her home in Hudson at the age of 95. She had no survivors.

	The Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes Papers document her costume design work for plays, ballets, and other productions from the 1950s to the 1970s, as well as other professional and personal activities before, during, and after her marriage to Norman Bel Geddes. The material includes costume designs, correspondence, notes, scripts, treatments, typescript articles and essays, photographs, artwork, architectural drawings, maps, address books, datebooks, notebooks, contracts, legal and financial documents, medical records, clippings, photocopies, and printed material. The papers are organized into three series: I. Productions, 1953-1988, undated; II. Projects, 1927-1994, undated; and III. Personal and Professional Material, 1901-2002, undated.
	Series I contains material related to Lutyens Bel Geddes’s costume design work for theater, ballet, opera, and television productions, primarily from the 1960s and 1970s. The papers contain few records of the Edith Lutyens costume shop that was dissolved following marriage to Norman Bel Geddes. Designs for The Crucible (1953), a book of costume costs for various productions in the year 1949, and lists of costumes that were sold after the shop closed in 1954 are the only items known to be from this period. Productions Lutyens Bel Geddes designed for after her husband’s death are, for the most part, well documented, with costume designs and sketches, costume plots and breakdowns, correspondence, notes, programs, and publicity clippings for most of the shows represented. Notable in this series, in addition to designs for The Crucible, are designs for Joffrey Ballet’s The Clowns (1968), which were featured in Time magazine and other publications, and exhibited at the Capricorn Gallery in New York.
	Costume designs, correspondence, programs, and other items document Lutyens Bel Geddes’s work on productions with African American directors, choreographers, and performers, including the musical Kicks & Co., produced and directed by Lorraine Hansberry; Katherine Dunham’s adaptation of Charles Gounod’s opera Faust; the Alvin Ailey Dance Theater; and stage performances and a television special featuring the George Faison Dancers. A file for the National Repertory Theatre production of The Madwoman of Chaillot (1965) contains notes for an unproduced musical version with music by Georges Auric and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, a Bel Geddes Productions project. Unsigned lyric sheets included with this material do not appear to have been written by Sondheim. Correspondence with agent Barna Ostertag in Series III includes material for various productions listed in Series I. In addition to material listed by production title, Series I contains many costume designs for unidentified productions. Theater names listed in parentheses after production titles are in New York City, unless otherwise specified.
	Series II. Projects is subdivided into projects that Lutyens Bel Geddes worked on with Norman Bel Geddes, and projects that she worked on after his death. Many of the Norman Bel Geddes projects were labeled with a job number, according to the system he used to organize his files, which has been transcribed in the folder title. In many instances, related material labeled with the same job number can be found in the Norman Bel Geddes Theater and Industrial Design Papers. A few items pertain to Norman Bel Geddes’s professional activities before he met Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes, but most relate to daily business operations during their marriage, or projects they worked on together, such as a costume design, index cards, and outlines for an unproduced adaptation of the opera Madama Butterfly.
	Projects undertaken after the death of Norman Bel Geddes include professional activities not directly related to costume design (for example, her work for Theatre Arts magazine and later work as real estate broker) and prospects for paid employment that were unrealized or unfinished. Unrealized projects include those related to the proposed Bel Geddes Productions company, including productions of a musical called "Intermezzo" and an adaptation of Robert Lowell’s translation of Jean Racine’s play Phaedra, and many potential business ventures explored on her trips to Colombia, such as mining emeralds and manufacturing essential oils. A significant volume of typed recipes, draft pages, and correspondence, along with clippings collected from magazines and newspapers, document her 1960s work on a proposed cookbook based on recipes served at the Ritz Hotel in Paris. Later Ritz cookbooks issued by various publishing houses echoed this concept but were not projects Lutyens Bel Geddes contributed to.
	Series III. Personal and Professional Material contains address books, biographical material, collected material, correspondence, financial and legal documents, medical records, photographs, material related to Lutyens Bel Geddes’s donation of the Norman Bel Geddes Theater and Industrial Design Papers, publicity clippings, union-related material, and material related to household operations, pets, and travel. Biographical material includes notes and draft pages for a planned autobiography as well as data sheets and curriculum vitae. Collected material comprises files on various topics and works by others. Writings by others range from photocopies of unpublished works by Katherine Dunham including short novels, a short story, and a commencement address, to various works about Norman Bel Geddes.
	Correspondence files consist of a mix of incoming and outgoing correspondence. Notable correspondents include Barbara Bel Geddes and other members of the Bel Geddes family, cousin Naomi Lutyens, choreographer Katherine Dunham, screenwriter Michael Dyne, director Compton Bennett, singer Marie Powers, actress Gracie Fields, playwrights Arthur Miller and Dale Wasserman, actor John Houseman, and writer Guy Murchie, among others. Folders of correspondence with Barna Ostertag, who was Lutyens Bel Geddes’s agent during the 1960s, include material related to various productions listed in Series I. A small volume of correspondence containing personal information is restricted due to privacy concerns during the lifetime of individuals mentioned in the letters. These letters will be open to researchers no later than 1 January 2033.
	Files on household matters include recipes, menus, and guest lists for dinner parties, reflecting Lutyens Bel Geddes’s interest in cooking and entertaining. Her pets are also well documented in Series III, including numerous dogs and the pair of pygmy marmoset monkeys she and Norman Bel Geddes cared for at their home in Jamaica. Medical records document holistic treatment regimens followed by Lutyens Bel Geddes after she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1990, among other subjects. Files on travel document trips to various locations, including a lengthy stay at Katherine Dunham’s house in Haiti in 1960. Material related to union memberships include a membership book, newsletters, and other printed material, as well as correspondence.
	Photographs include early photographs of Lutyens Bel Geddes as a child, and photographs of her sporting activities as a young woman, as well as family photographs, primarily taken on trips to Belgium to visit her mother and sister Jenny. Numerous prints and albums document Lutyens Bel Geddes’s social activities with friends, her international travel, her home in Hudson, New York, and her dogs. Publicity files contain clippings and printed material documenting the activities of Lutyens Bel Geddes and friends such as Katherine Dunham. Series III also contains many files related to the sale of the Norman Bel Geddes Theater and Industrial Design Papers to the University of Texas at Austin, and Lutyens Bel Geddes’s subsequent work publicizing her husband’s collection and granting permissions for use in exhibits and scholarly work.
	Where present, original order at the folder level has been maintained; although most of the original folders that housed materials have been discarded, folder titles are retained in the container list’s descriptions, where they are placed in single quotation marks.
	Where present, original order at the folder level has been maintained; although most of the original folders that housed materials have been discarded, folder titles are retained in the container list’s descriptions, where they are placed in single quotation marks.
	Some material in the collection was heavily contaminated by mold when it arrived at the Ransom Center. This material was cleaned to remove mold spores and dirt. The container list indicates which folders contain material that was treated for mold contamination; mold odors remain on some manuscripts and patrons who are sensitive to mold may wish to wear a mask while examining this material in the Ransom Center’s Reading and Viewing Room. Some clippings in the collection are brittle and too fragile to handle; therefore, the originals are restricted and replaced with photocopies. Folders that contain photocopied surrogates are indicated in the container list. A disbound manual for Norman Bel Geddes’s Theatre Department is fragile and contains a complex mix of materials; researchers in the Reading and Viewing Room should ask for assistance while handling this object.

The Norman Bel Geddes Theater and Industrial Design Papers at the Harry Ransom Center contain additional material created by or related to Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes, including correspondence, memos, written works, calendars, photographs, clippings, and sound recordings. The Arthur Miller Papers, also at the Center, contain production photographs and other documentation of the 1953 production of The Crucible. The Center’s Joffrey Ballet Collection contains material related to various Joffrey Ballet productions. The New York Public Library’s Theatre on Film and Tape Collection contains a videotaped interview with Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes recorded in 1992.

	The following materials were transferred for specialized housing or description:
	Books from the library of Edith Lutyens Bel Geddes were transferred to the Ransom Center Library. These books are cataloged online in The University of Texas Library Catalog.
	Personal effects were transferred to the Center’s Costume and Personal Effects Collection and are described separately in a database.
	An unpublished, non-commercial audio recording was transferred to the Center's Sound Recordings Collection and is described separately in a database.

Book withdrawals, 1958-1989, undated

Container 34.8

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