Which designer created the 1937 Lobster Dress in collaboration with Salvador Dalí?

Elsa Schiaparelli created the 1937 Lobster Dress in collaboration with Salvador Dalí.

The white silk organza dress featured a large red lobster painted across the skirt. Dalí supplied the surrealist imagery, while Schiaparelli translated the unexpected motif into a wearable couture design. The garment was photographed on the Duchess of Windsor, Wallis Simpson, which increased its public fame.

Schiaparelli was closely connected with the Surrealist movement and repeatedly used visual jokes, unusual objects, and artistic collaborations in her work. The Lobster Dress is one of the clearest examples of fashion functioning as a form of avant-garde art rather than only as decoration.

The dress is sometimes confused with Schiaparelli’s other famous collaborations, including the Shoe Hat and the Tears Dress. Those designs also involved surrealist ideas, but the red lobster motif specifically identifies the 1937 dress created with Dalí.