Omar Kiam was a Mexican-born American fashion designer. He had his own studio in New York City and headed the film costume design departments for Sam Goldwyn Productions from 1935 to 1941. In 1941 he became a head designer for the Ben Reig fashion label.
Kiam was sent to Riverview, a preparatory school in Poughkeepsie, New York, where he was given the nickname Omar by classmates during their study of Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat. Later he went to study at the University of Texas but lasted there only one week.
Kiam decided on a business career and went to work in the stock-room of a millinery company in St. Louis, Misouri, at $10 a week. But his natural flair for fashion led to a rapid promotion to the design room. In 1914 he traded hats for furs and St. Louis for New York City. He was hired as a sorter of raw skins by the retail firm of Julius Klugman Sons, but found the job so distasteful that he asked to run errands instead. Having become aware that the company's conservatism was turning away customers who wanted up-to-date styles, Kiam took it upon himself to promise a disgruntled customer the kind of design she wanted, whispering to her that if she returned in two weeks, he would have a canvas coat shell ready for her to try on. He worked in secret on the design, then persuaded his employers to make up the coat. From then on--except for a period of service in the army during World War I--Kiam designed furs and eventually became half-owner of the company.
He began designing dresses that would show his fur designs to best advantage, but the dresses themselves soon won nearly as much attention as the furs. In 1927 Kiam and Klugman's combination fur-and-dress business was dissolved when jurisdictional problems arose between the dress workers' union and the fur workers' union; Kiam became head of the dress division.
During the 1930's, Kiam began to design for the theater, doing costumes for Dinner at Eight (1932) and The Man Who Came to Dinner (1939). In 1935 he was invited to design for Goldwyn productions. A number of popular fashions originated in his movie designs, including the strapless evening dress and the fur-lined coat. The wedding gown worn by Merle Oberon as Cathy in Wuthering Heights was copied by several manufacturers for brides of 1939 and 1940. Kiam also made overalls fashionable three decades in advance of the "jeans generation" by pairing them with plaid shirts as outfits for Miriam Hopkins and Merle Oberon in These Three (1936).
In 1941 Kiam returned to New York because, as he was quoted in the World-Telegram, "I prefer and find it more interesting to design for a great many women than for just a few. " After designing for Eileen Friedell, Incorporated, he joined the Ben Reig Corporation, with which he was associated for the rest of his life. The Reig-Kiam label became a mark of excellence in American design, and Kiam's day and evening creations were featured regularly in Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Town and Country, both editorially and in advertisements.
Kiam's fashions were known for quality tailoring and were distinguished by such fine details as cord eyelet, a latticework feature he devised during World War II when government restrictions made it almost impossible to obtain lace and other trimmings. His design innovations included the summer fur; silver fox on a chiffon dress and red fox on a black velvet cape. During six years in Hollywood, he created costumes for more than thirty motion pictures, among them A Star Is Born, Call of the Wild, Dodsworth, The Adventures of Marco Polo, and Clive of India. In 1942 Kiam received the Nieman Marcus Award. In 1944 he was selected by Life magazine as one of the leading designers. His designs were exhibited in a Metropolitan Museum show in 1945, and in 1946 he won an American Fashion Critics Award for his "outstanding contribution to American fashion. " The Custom Tailors of America named him one of the best-dressed men of 1946. Kiam, described by Virginia Pope of the New York Times as "one of the most distinguished designers of the wholesale field" and "a perfectionist, " referred to his designs as clothes "for the woman who would rather be smart than pretty. "
Omar Kiam never married.
