Important Historical Fashion Design: Merry Hull Linen Gloves Dated 1938

Glove collectors will be enchanted by this early, exquisite pair of linen Merry Hull gloves.

Gladys Whitcomb Geissmann moved to NYC from Columbus, Ohio and changed her name  to Merry Hull. In 1938, she invented the first 3-dimensional glove design with additional panels that gave a more tailored fit as well as more freedom in movement. Her unique design eliminated the problem of popping seams and bulky gathers around the fingers. 

Merry Hull's name was well known to fashionable women in the late 1930s, through to the 1950s. Her glove advertisements were in multitudes of fashion trade and retail magazines including Cosmopolitan and Vogue...as well as nearly every newspaper. 

Merry Hull's early label is in this pair of exquisite gloves, which date to between 1938-1939 by patent filing and grant dates. The gloves carry that brilliant gold, embroidered label with the hand-with-wings logo and first patent number of 2,125,673 also embroidered inside. Her patent filing date for this glove design was March 1, 1938 and it was granted that year.  

It is Merry Hull's ingenious design that allows the gloves to be made from fabric that is not stretchy. The gloves fit the hand like a well tailored couture suit.

This particular pair of Merry Hull gloves are made from extremely fine, woven linen with what appears to be a small amount of silk plied into the linen fiber, which adds that additional sheen. The gloves are nothing less than luxurious. 

From an estate, these gloves have not been on the market since they were first purchased decades ago. Not only are they stunning in color and quite unusual, but they are also historically important in the history of American fashions. 

Merry Hull gloves just like these are found in important museum collections and curators have written academic papers about this designer and the importance of her patented glove-making designs. In fact, it is said that she alone changed glove design for the first time in 300 years. 

One reference to research if you wish to learn more is from The Costume Society of America's Gayle Strege, curator at Ohio State University Historic Costume & Textiles Collection titled Merry Hull’s Gloves. The paper was presented by Strege at the Costume Society of America Region III annual meeting, St. Paul, Minnesota, October 2002. 

According to history, Hull's patent was sold almost immediately, and Merry Hull made an impressive $200,000. Today, Hull is listed as one of the top American inventors in history as well as historically important fashion designer.