Two other famous fashion houses-Varshavsky and Antoinette--were owned by Russian Jewish women. The latter had an enviable reputation from the 1920s through the 1950s. It was located on Rynochnaya Street, not far from Kitaiskaya, in house number 58, as part of Louvre, and advertised itself as a Salon of Ladies' Finery that «always has a large selection of ladies' coats, dresses, hats, and every kind of trim. Afford-able prices for everyone.» The Salon Antoinette is remembered fondly by Olga Sergeyevna Morozova, who was married to the owner of the highly regarded Cosmopolitan chocolate factory and now lives in Japan. The author also located another client of Antoinette: the famous Harbin opera singer, coloratura soprano Galina Achair-Dobrotvorskaya, who lived in Australia and she reported, «I ordered my dresses from Antoinette; they were rather expensive, but in the 1940s I was making a good salary and I could afford it.» 12
Stores selling linens for men and women flourished in Harbin. The previously mentioned Volga-Baikal, on the corner of Kitaiskaya and Konnaya streets, offered its shoppers: «Shirts of linen, zephyr, silk, poplin, and others. Collars of every style, ties, braces, studs. Ladies' lingerie--ready-to-wear and custom. Pajamas. Tricot knit lingerie--wool, silk, and fildex.» Another flourishing lingerie salon was the Belosol, managed by Iosif Iudovich Belokamen. The atelier was at 17 Koreiskaya Street, and the retail store at 169 Kitaiskaya. Other linen workshops included Rybachenko's atelier at 65 Novotorgovaya Street, the salon belonging to the Eskin brothers, and the Konros Salon, owned by the Tysmenitsky brothers.
Of the corset salons, we must men-
Opposite: The Mikheyev family, Russian migrs in Harbin, 1922.
Above top: Ludmila Vasilyeva-Lebedeva, Tsingtao, 1920s.
Above bottom: Ludmila VasilyevaLebedeva with a friend, Tsingtao, 1920s.
Above right: Olga Driabina-Vassilieva, concert master of the Russian opera at the Railroad Assembly,
Tablet PC/MID, Harbin 1928.
Overleaf: A ball for the Russian colony, Shanghai, 1922.
tion Elegant, which was owned by Anna Alexeyevna Tostoganova, at 76 Novotorgovaya Street, and Sofia Mikhailovna Braun's salon at 59 Kitaiskaya Street. Small lingerie orders were accepted by the workshops of Ekaterina Petrovna Evstigneyeva, Emilia Kazimirovna Pavlovskaya, and Alexandra Arsenyevna Chervinskaya, as well as by the ObEnisei, located at 23 Mostovaya Street.
In the early 1920s various tailoring and sewing schools opened in Harbin; the best known were Woman's Work, run by Krasheninnikova, Kosheleva, Zherbenina, Kurdumova, Rotkegel, and Miller; Yevgenia Ivanovna Emelyanova's Worth at 61 Novotorgovaya Street; Elizaveta Andreyevna Zhilina's Teodor; and Classes by Vladimir Ivanovich Yuzhanov.
The demand for clothing was great--the city's population was growing due of the influx of migrs, as well as the Soviet workers with the CERR-so not only experienced seamstresses,
Glasses, but many graduates of the tailoring and sewing courses opened ateliers out of their homes. Natalya Timofeyevna Vatunina made hats and dresses to order; Praskovya Vasilyevna Zozulin-
skaya opened a small business called Viennese Chic; Sofia Ilyinichna Orlova's company was called Madame Sophie; Mila Grigoryevna Varaksina owned Record; and Elizaveta Ivanovna Malyavina had her atelier at 28 Yamskaya Street. Noteworthy workshops for ladies' clothing were Moscow Seamstress Avdokhina, who took orders at 59/5 Borodinskaya Street, and Artel of Ladies' Seamstresses at 25 Yamskaya Street. There were shops that sewed for both men and women, including the
Above left: A window of the Russian art supply store, Shanghai, 1930s.
Below left: A window of a Russian Siberian fur store, Shanghai, 1930s.
famous Riga Tailor Workshop owned by Petrovsky at 54 Belgiiskaya Street; the Association of Tailors owned by Ruvin Aaronovich Tsivian at 1 Birzhevaya Street; B. M. Grinshpunt owned by Rudolf Ionovich Obertik at 18 Pskovskaya Street; and Andrei Ivanovich Alexeyev's atelier at 8 Shkolnaya Street. All in all, there were more than seventy ladies' tailors in Harbin who made «dresses for all occasions in life.»
Some tailors in Harbin specialized in outerwear for women, such as cloaks
Above: A dress of beige silk with hand embroidery (from the wardrobe of Driabina-Vassilieva), Harbin, c. 1927.
and coats. At 47 Pekarnaya Street, Nikolai Modestovich Averkiev opened a tailor shop and Mikhail Filoppovich Polizhak opened his Salon of Ladies' Dresses. The demand for knitwear, so necessary in the fierce Manchurian winters when temperatures went down to minus 40 degrees centigrade, prompted Vladimir Gavrilovich Bilan to open the Salon of Knitted Goods at 23 Artilleriiskaya Street.
Shoe manufacturing was a thriving business in Harbin. Large stores like Churin's sold fashionable and warm shoes and all kinds of high boots, according to Zinaida Zhemchuzhina. Matvei Stepanovich Borisov owned a shoe store called Goods from Nizhny
Opposite: Advertisements in the magazine Rubezh for fashion ateliers and cloth manufacturers in Harbin in the 1920s-30s.