SHAW, BENJAMIN

SHAW, BENJAMIN (1898–1988), U.S. financier. Shaw, who spent virtually his whole life in the garment business, began as a dress manufacturer but became known as "Mr. Seventh Avenue" because of his skill as a financial backer and advisor to a series of highly successful designers. Those in whom he invested included Oscar de la Renta, Halston, Norman Norell, Jane Derby, Donald Brooks, Geoffrey Beene, Giorgio San'   Angelo, and Stephen Burrows. In addition, he introduced at least two Paris designers to the U.S. and helped make Gloria Vanderbilt an iconic jeans label. Shaw backed his designers with his production expertise, his network of retail contacts, and his money. Born in Kiev as Benjamin Schwartz, he was brought to New York City at the age of three. As a child, he got his first taste of the garment business when he was sent to find buttons and zippers for his mother, Rose, a dressmaker on the Lower East Side. His formal education ended early and he went to work as a messenger. After learning the rudiments of sales and production and changing his name to Shaw because "there were too many Schwartzes in the Manhattan telephone directory," he became a partner in Wieman, Wilkes & Shaw in 1925. Four years later, the stock market collapsed and so did his company. In 1935, Shaw launched a dress house called Elfreda and ran it until 1954, when he retired. Six months later, he was back in business, first importing the apparel collections of French designers Nina Ricci and Pierre Balmain for an American customer. In 1956 he bought into the Jane Derby dress firm, where Oscar de la Renta subsequently became the designer. In 1969, a few years after Derby's death, the company – then named for de la Renta – was sold to publicly owned Richton International. Shaw, his son Gerald, and de la Renta bought it back in 1974. In the interim, Shaw invested in Halston, one of the most popular U.S. designers of the 1970s and early 1980s. When the Halston business was sold in 1973, Shaw said, he "made millions." Other associations with designers followed. Gerald Shaw, who became president of Oscar de la Renta Ltd., said of his father, "He couldn't make a pattern, but he could tell whether a dress worked. He had a talent for spotting talent." (Mort Sheinman (2nd ed.)