Barbara Mullen photographed in Manhattan for a Supima advertisement (1957)
Mid-century was one of the most exciting and glamorous times in fashion. A world where photography was just developing as an art form thanks to Helmut Newton, Irving Penn and their peers. A world where notorious editors Diana Vreeland and Carmel Snow were paving the way for career-driven women and Dior’s New Look would change the course of fashion as much as rock ‘n’ roll. However, many stories remain hidden from the history books. Now one writer is hoping to shine a light on what the era was really like through the story of Barbara Mullen, one of the most sought-after models of the 40s and 50s.
The Replacement Girl: A Life in 24 Frames, written by journalist John-Michael O’Sullivan and currently being crowdfunded on Unbound, is a biography that not only gives a voice to one of the many ‘seen-but-not-heard’ women of that period, but uncovers the rise of the modelling industry. Mullen, now 90 and living between Switzerland and New Mexico, began her career as a mannequin for Bergdorf Goodman but got her big break when she stood in on a shoot with Lillian Bassman aged 19. The photographer famed for her spectral black and white fashion images for Harper’s Bazaar was the first to dub Mullen ‘The Replacement Girl’, a nickname that stuck. “It ties into a bigger question about how we perceive and value models more generally,” says O’Sullivan of his choice to use it in the title of the book.
He first became interested in Mullen’s story after stumbling across pictures of the Irish-American beauty online, shot by names who are much better known including Richard Avedon, Guy Bourdin, and Horst P. Horst. Unable to find out more about the woman behind the image, he set about doing his own research and in 2013 he met and interviewed Mullen for an article. Over the following years, O’Sullivan, who is based in London, and Mullen began compiling the book, using the beautiful imagery she helped to create as markers to share her experience. “Barbara is a fabulous storyteller,” O’Sullivan reflects. “Her description of her first-ever Vogue shoot, in John Rawlings’ penthouse studio, in the summer of 1947; the way she evoked the creation of that first photograph, from her perspective, made me realize how little we understand about how fashion images are constructed.”
Barbara Mullen photographed in Greece for Elle (1956)
As well as many of the best photographers of the time, Mullen also worked with designers Dior and Balenciaga, and icons like Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn. She opened the first ever Emanuel Ungaro show in 1965 and appeared on the pages of all the big glossies, including Harper’s Bazaar USA who used one of her cover images for the artwork of their 120th anniversary celebration book in 2017. The same image was projected onto the side of the Empire State Building for the book’s launch. It was this moment that spurred on O’Sullivan to find a publisher for her story, “Apart from a personal desire to do justice to Barbara, was the fact that she represents a whole generation of invisible women who made a vital contribution to the evolution of fashion modelling,” he says of his motivation to tell the story of the nameless woman projected onto the New York landmark. “They were the first models to make it a long-term, successful, lucrative career; the first to become brands in their own right, and to become well-known to mainstream audiences of that era; and, of course, they starred in some of the most iconic images in fashion history.”
She continued her life in fashion in Switzerland after meeting her second husband, a ski instructor, in Klosters. She opened a successful fashion boutique named Barbara’s Bazar and continued to do occasional modelling, including for Anabelle Magazine which she would later become fashion editor of.
Mullen’s story may sound all glamour and glitz but O’Sullivan says that many fashion professionals today will empathize. “Her story highlights just how contemporary that period actually was; just like today, post-war fashion (and fashion photography) was a world of young, struggling, ambitious talents trying to create something extraordinary.”
Back The Replacement Girl: A Life in 24 Frames by John Michael O’Sullivan on Unbound here.
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Barbara Mullen photographed in Manhattan for a Supima advertisement (1957)
Mid-century was one of the most exciting and glamorous times in fashion. A world where photography was just developing as an art form thanks to Helmut Newton, Irving Penn and their peers. A world where notorious editors Diana Vreeland and Carmel Snow were paving the way for career-driven women and Dior’s New Look would change the course of fashion as much as rock ‘n’ roll. However, many stories remain hidden from the history books. Now one writer is hoping to shine a light on what the era was really like through the story of Barbara Mullen, one of the most sought-after models of the 40s and 50s.
The Replacement Girl: A Life in 24 Frames, written by journalist John-Michael O’Sullivan and currently being crowdfunded on Unbound, is a biography that not only gives a voice to one of the many ‘seen-but-not-heard’ women of that period, but uncovers the rise of the modelling industry. Mullen, now 90 and living between Switzerland and New Mexico, began her career as a mannequin for Bergdorf Goodman but got her big break when she stood in on a shoot with Lillian Bassman aged 19. The photographer famed for her spectral black and white fashion images for Harper’s Bazaar was the first to dub Mullen ‘The Replacement Girl’, a nickname that stuck. “It ties into a bigger question about how we perceive and value models more generally,” says O’Sullivan of his choice to use it in the title of the book.
He first became interested in Mullen’s story after stumbling across pictures of the Irish-American beauty online, shot by names who are much better known including Richard Avedon, Guy Bourdin, and Horst P. Horst. Unable to find out more about the woman behind the image, he set about doing his own research and in 2013 he met and interviewed Mullen for an article. Over the following years, O’Sullivan, who is based in London, and Mullen began compiling the book, using the beautiful imagery she helped to create as markers to share her experience. “Barbara is a fabulous storyteller,” O’Sullivan reflects. “Her description of her first-ever Vogue shoot, in John Rawlings’ penthouse studio, in the summer of 1947; the way she evoked the creation of that first photograph, from her perspective, made me realize how little we understand about how fashion images are constructed.”
Barbara Mullen photographed in Greece for Elle (1956)
As well as many of the best photographers of the time, Mullen also worked with designers Dior and Balenciaga, and icons like Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn. She opened the first ever Emanuel Ungaro show in 1965 and appeared on the pages of all the big glossies, including Harper’s Bazaar USA who used one of her cover images for the artwork of their 120th anniversary celebration book in 2017. The same image was projected onto the side of the Empire State Building for the book’s launch. It was this moment that spurred on O’Sullivan to find a publisher for her story, “Apart from a personal desire to do justice to Barbara, was the fact that she represents a whole generation of invisible women who made a vital contribution to the evolution of fashion modelling,” he says of his motivation to tell the story of the nameless woman projected onto the New York landmark. “They were the first models to make it a long-term, successful, lucrative career; the first to become brands in their own right, and to become well-known to mainstream audiences of that era; and, of course, they starred in some of the most iconic images in fashion history.”
She continued her life in fashion in Switzerland after meeting her second husband, a ski instructor, in Klosters. She opened a successful fashion boutique named Barbara’s Bazar and continued to do occasional modelling, including for Anabelle Magazine which she would later become fashion editor of.
Mullen’s story may sound all glamour and glitz but O’Sullivan says that many fashion professionals today will empathize. “Her story highlights just how contemporary that period actually was; just like today, post-war fashion (and fashion photography) was a world of young, struggling, ambitious talents trying to create something extraordinary.”
Back The Replacement Girl: A Life in 24 Frames by John Michael O’Sullivan on Unbound here.
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