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Dress & Doll. Sophie was born in Houston, Tex. Her father, Felix Haas, a tobacco merchant, died when she was four years old and a year later her mother married Dr. John Alexander McLeay, a Canadian surgeon, and the family moved to Atlanta, Ga. (Now 80, Mrs. McLeay lives alone at New York's Hotel Delmonico.) Sophie's first fling at designing was as a child in Atlanta; she made clothes for her dolls. Her mother believed in girls' marrying young, so Sophie obliged her by marrying at 19, went to live with her husband in Philadelphia, where he was in the leather business. For nine years she lived the superficially quiet life of a well-to-do housewife, spent her spare time designing clothes for amateur theatricals. Then she was divorced ("it was all very friendly—we just decided we didn't get on together").
Adam Gimbel, a chronic bachelor whom she had met socially some years previously, hired her after a look at some of her theatrical designs—as a "stylist" at Saks. (Stylists were experts in good taste who counseled buyers on what was "chic.") One of her jobs was to go to Paris and buy French models to bring back for Saks to copy. In 1929, he asked her to take over the then slipping Salon Moderne.
The French and all other designers guard their new styles from each other like atomic-bomb secrets (no customers can get into Sophie's salon unless they have been "introduced" and she is sure they aren't there to crib her ideas). But after their showings they are glad to have American style-cribbers buy them to copy; it is a large part of their business. Sophie was returning from such a Paris mission in 1931, when, on the last day out, Adam called her by ship-to-shore phone from New York: "Hold your breath, we're going to be married tomorrow." They got married on a Saturday and Sophie went back to work on Monday.
Run a Salon. The trouble with the salon was that it had no prestige. Determinedly Sophie set out to get some.
One way was to design for Broadway shows. So Sophie designed for 29 shows one year and 32 the next: among them were Dodsworth, The Women, Reunion in Vienna. As customers began to find their way to the salon, she dropped all theatrical designing except as an occasional favor for one of her friends. The profit was not worth the worry. "They always beat down your price and then wanted another 10% off for the publicity," Sophie says.
As the salon prospered, Sophie put out a cheaper ready-to-wear line—the Sophie Originals—which are sold in nine specialty shops around the country for as little as $89. A month ago, Sophie-expanded further. She opened a branch of her salon in Saks's Hollywood store, to the enthusiastic squeals of screen queens and producers' wives. In the first week, the new salon grossed $49,000, much more than Sophie had expected. Hedy Lamarr ordered seven Sophie numbers. Darryl Zanuck told her confidentially: "Our stars simply refuse to wear those outlandish new things." Hollywood had one complaint: Sophie's prices were "too cheap."
"If they don't pay twice as much as a dress is worth, they think it's no good," said Sophie, then added stoutly: "But I'll be darned if I'll raise my prices."