Willi Donnell Smith
(February 29, 1948 – April 17, 1987)
African American international fashion designer.
Smith was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He studied commercial art at Mastbaum Technical High School. He then attended Philadelphia College of Art for fashion illustration. He relocated to New York City to go to Parsons The New School for Design, the art and design college of The New School.
In 1967, Smith quit Parsons to pursue a career designing on his own. In 1969 he designed a label for Digits, a sportswear company. In 1973, Smith, along with his sister Toukie Smith, founded their own clothing company that soon failed. Smith continued to design and in 1976 he went into business with Laurie Mallet and called the company “WilliWear Limited.”
He designed the wedding dress worn by Mary Jane Watson when she married Peter Parker in the Spider-Man comic book and comic strip in 1987, and the suits for Edwin Schlossberg and his groomsmen when he married Caroline Kennedy in 1986. Smith also designed the uniforms for the workers on Christo’s 1985 wrapping of the Pont Neuf Bridge in Paris and clothes for Spike Lee’s film School Daze (1987).
Smith worked with many other designers and artists during his time at WilliWear including Antthony Mark Hankins, James Mischka, Julia Santos-Solomon, Jon Coffelt, John Bartlett and Andre Walker among many others. Smith partnered with Jhane Barnes on some of his earlier shows.
Smith was the costume designer for Secret Pastures, which premiered at Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival in 1984, one of Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company’ s first major works.
On April 16, 1987, Smith was admitted to Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York City after contracting shigella and pneumonia while on a trip to India to buy fabric in February 1987. While in the hospital he died of pneumonia complicated by shigella the following day at the age of 39.
At the time of his death, Smith was regarded as one of the most successful African-American designers in the fashion industry. His company, WilliWear Limited, launched in 1976, would go on to sell $25 million worth of clothing a year.[ After Smith’s death, his business partner continued the line with various designers creating collections. Without Smith, the company floundered. Due to financial problems and poor sales, WilliWear Limited ceased production in 1990.
Willi Smith Awards of acomplishments.
Smith earned two scholarships to attend Parsons School of Design in 1965.
In September 1983, Smith won an American Fashion Critics’ Coty Award for women’s fashion. He was the second African American designer to win the award, the first being Stephen Burrows.
In 1985, Smith won a Cutty Sark Award for Men’s Fashion.
In 1988, then New York City mayor David Dinkins proclaimed February 23 “Willi Smith Day” in honor of the designer’s achievements.
In 2002, Smith was honored with a bronze plaque for Fashion Walk of Fame along Seventh Avenue.