J. Hyde Crawford, the fashion illustrator who created the modern bouquet of violets symbol for department store chain Bonwit Teller, died earlier this month in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. He was 82.
In the 1960s, Crawford was a contract artist drawing fashion illustrations for several retail clients when Bonwit Teller asked him to refresh the bouquet of violets that had been its symbol.
“I made the new one fresher and bolder, and it took me about 25 minutes,” Crawford later said. “Next morning I sent it up to the store and they loved it.”
The image began on Bonwit’s shopping bags but eventually made its way to the retailer’s storefronts, merchandise (like its umbrellas), even its charge cards.
In 1986 (three years before it declared bankruptcy), Bonwit Teller held a party for Crawford to celebrate the image. “Stores don’t often honor freelance artists,” he said at the time.
Crawford, a Jacksonville, Fla., native and Parsons School of Design graduate, also founded the Quadrille fabric and wallpaper company.