Ceil Chapman (née Mitchell; February 19, 1912 – July 13, 1979) was an American fashion designer who worked in New York City from the 1940s to the 1960s.
She created glamorous cocktail and party dresses, and worked with celebrity clients including television and movie actresses.
Around 1949 Ceil Chapman made an informal deal to lend clothes to NBC TV shows in exchange for program credit.
Chapman was approached by a young staff costume designer, Joan Feldman, at NBC who was frustrated at the lack of resources for modern clothing for stars of dramatic shows like Betty Furness.
In 1955, Chapman won the Mademoiselle Merit Award, after a poll asking college girls to cite the country's most popular designer for the young.
[12] Other celebrity clients included Deborah Kerr,[10] Greer Garson,[13] Grace Kelly[14] and Aretha Franklin.
She reportedly "sashayed back to the powder room, checked the jacket part of the dress, removed the big organza bow at the neckline, and returned to her sirloin looking absolutely different.
The Staten Island Historical Society's collections include a labeled Ceil Chapman evening gown with a bodice of multicolored pastel lace and a long, full skirt of powder-pink tulle.
[22] Chapman was among those who succeeded in adapting Christian Dior's "New Look" for relatively affordable cocktail wear targeted toward the American ready-to-wear market.
Chapman died at Calvary Hospital in the Bronx after a two-year illness with lung cancer on Friday, July 13, 1979.
Her obituary in the Staten Island Advance reported that she had not been informed of the death of her husband, Tom Rogers, just a few days earlier.