page_title: Frankie Welch
section_title: Career
hierarchical_section_title: Frankie Welch / Career
caption_attribution_description: English: A brocade gown designed by Frankie Welch for First Lady Betty Ford. The dark pink gown with gold embroidery through features an “oriental” fashion with high neck at the back, a v-neck in front, long sleeves, and a zipper.
context_page_description: Frankie Welch was a fashion designer from Rome, Georgia. She is primarily known for designing scarves for prominent political figures, which she sold from her boutique in Alexandria, Virginia. After a career as a home economics teacher which spanned nearly two decades, Welch began working as a fashion consultant. Developing a clientele, she moved into designing accessories and then dresses. Welch was the designer of a dress worn by First Lady Betty Ford, which is now on display in the Smithsonian's First Ladies' Hall in the National Museum of American History. She also designed dresses on display at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.
context_section_description: Welch began her career in Madison, Wisconsin, teaching elementary school and the couple had their first daughter, Peggy. When Bill was transferred to work with the CIA in 1952, the family moved to Washington, D. C. in 1953 and Welch continued teaching. She worked as a sewing instructor at the Washington and Lee High School in Arlington, Virginia and had her second daughter, Genie. In 1960, she designed a versatile dress known as "The Frankie", as an instructional aid to help her students visualize waistline treatments.  That same year, Ingenue, a teen magazine named her the "Outstanding Home Economics Teacher of the Nation" and awarded her with a trip to visit the fashion houses of Paris and Rome. In September 1963, she opened a shop at 305 Cameron Street in Alexandria, Virginia, operating an official guest house on the upper floors and her clothing shop on the street level. The house was noted in guidebooks as a tourist attraction, because George Washington and his men dined there and it was the first bank in Virginia. By 1964, she was marketing "The Frankie" nationwide. The adaptable design came in various fabrics and hem-lengths, and could be worn in multiple ways, depending on how the waist ties were joined.
  Meeting Washington's elite women at various social functions, Welch began consulting with them on fashion. Developing a clientele, she soon switched to design. In 1967, as part of an initiative for the Native American education service, she designed a scarf featuring the Cherokee syllabary. Welch donated one dollar from the purchase of each scarf to the higher education fund of the Eastern Cherokee. The scarf caught the attention of First Lady Lady Bird Johnson. Johnson asked Welch to create a scarf which would promote her "Discover America" campaign. The scarf became a featured item at the first fashion show ever held at the White House. In 1968, she designed a scarf with a daisy pattern for the Republican National Convention and was then asked to design a scarf for Hubert Humphrey's presidential campaign featuring his HH logo. When Richard Nixon won the presidency, Welch was commissioned to design a scarf with his slogan "Forward Together" as a commemoration of his Inaugural. 
  After the Nixon resignation in 1974, First Lady Betty Ford wore a Welch design to greet the press. Her official photograph was taken in a Welch design made of green silk, which Ford had brought back from China. That same year, she published Indian Jewelry: How to Wear, Buy and Treasure America's First Fashion Pieces, which was full of tips on how to determine the quality of jewelry and gave information about various types of materials used in jewelry design. She also designed a collection of contemporary bracelets, earrings and necklaces for her store. Her husband died in 1975. In 1976, when Ford selected which gown was to be presented to the First Lady's Hall, she selected a Welch dress in a princess style, with a Chinese-style high collar. The dress was first worn in 1975 for the Shah of Iran's state dinner and later worn by the First Lady to a dinner for King Juan Carlos I of Spain and Queen Sofía in 1976. Welch designed Ford's official scarf, which she gave to visiting dignitaries, on a floral and polkadot background with the First Lady’s signature imprinted. 
  Among Welch's corporate clients were McDonald's and Time-Life. She designed scarfs and tote bags for Auburn University, the University of Georgia and West Point and organizations like the Arkansas Democrats Association, the American Medical Association, the Congressional Wives' Club, the Princeton Club, the United States Marine Corps, and the United States Historical Society, as well as St Paul's Cathedral in London, The Indianapolis 500, and the Watergate Hotel. She designed a dress and a scarf with a peanut motif for Jimmy Carter's gubernatorial race; a scarf for the United States Bicentennial featuring the original 13 colonies; and a series of scarves depicting the official state flowers of all fifty states. She later designed scarves with the peanut featured for Carter's pre
caption: First Lady Betty Ford's pink brocade gown by Frankie Welch, 1974
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