Arnold Isaacs, known as Arnold Scaasi, was a Canadian fashion designer who has created gowns for First Ladies Mamie Eisenhower, Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton, and Laura Bush, in addition to such notable personalities as Joan Crawford, Ivana Trump, Princess Yasmin Aga Khan, Lauren Bacall, Diahann Carroll, Elizabeth Taylor, Catherine Deneuve, Brooke Astor, Arlene Francis, Mitzi Gaynor and Mary Tyler Moore.
11 Facts About Arnold Scaasi
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Arnold Scaasi returned to Montreal to study at the Cotnoir-Capponi School of Design and completed his education at the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture Parisienne in Paris.
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Arnold Scaasi apprenticed at the House of Paquin before moving to New York City to work with designer Charles James.
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Arnold Scaasi won the prestigious Coty Fashion Critics Award in 1958.
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Arnold Scaasi was noted for his tailored suits and glamorous evening wear and cocktail dresses trimmed with feathers, fur, sequins, or fine embroidery.
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Arnold Scaasi later designed Streisand's contemporary wear for the 1970 film On a Clear Day You Can See Forever and costumes for Shirley MacLaine and Susan Sarandon in Loving Couples and Sally Field in Kiss Me Goodbye.
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Arnold Scaasi was presented with the Council of Fashion Designers of America Lifetime Achievement Award in 1996.
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Arnold Scaasi is the author of Arnold Scaasi: A Cut Above, published by Rizzoli in 1996, and Women I Have Dressed, published by Scribner in 2004.
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Arnold Scaasi died of cardiac arrest at a New York city hospital on August 3,2015, at the age of 85.
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In 2001, The Kent State University Museum mounted a major Arnold Scaasi retrospective curated by Anne Bissonnette to celebrate the museum's fifteenth anniversary.
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The MFA's Arnold Scaasi collection includes the famous sequined pants outfit which was worn by Barbra Streisand in 1969 when she won the Oscar for the movie Funny Girl, along with stage costumes worn in her early concerts, a fur ensemble worn on her famous trip to Canada in 1970, and costumes worn in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever.