1959 Manual de Corte y Alta Costura - Dress Book - Jose Marte edition?

I bought this dress making book (it even had some hand drawn & cut dress outlines but the size made me think they were for dolls?) off a friend who owns a 2nd hand furniture store. I looked up the title 'Manual de Corte y Alta Costura' and found some copies - selling for several hundred dollars(!) but I didn't find one that was a Jose Marte edition?
Can someone tell me what I have?
Thank you!

 

Alta Costura means Haute Couture, so the top of the fashion world. I don't think the book would be for dolls.
I don't know about the separate patterns though. What does the text on the patterns say?

José Martí was a poet and symbol of the struggle for independence from Spain. A lot of things in Cuba are named after him. The airport of Havana too.

 

Yes, Cuban as above. It's a textbook published for the National Institute of Cutting and Haute Couture in Havana. 13th edition in 1952. Not for dolls; it teaches pattern-making for women's clothing.

Debora

 

Where did you find other copies?

Debora

 

(Everything in Cuba is named for José Martí.)

Debora

 

I googled Manual de corte y alta costura book as i was looking at new things in my friend's office & saw a couple - but when I added Jose Marti edition nothing came up & I didn't go back & check more closely the first results - I just gave my friend the $40 he wanted for it and went home thinking I had a rare winner because of the "Jose Marti Edition" and because it was published the same year as Castro's revolution took over the Cuban government- and I thought it would be one of the last "couture" or fashion books published in Castro's Cuba for quite a while? (right?)
The outlines on the patterns are faint because they were written in pencil + they are in spanish - I can only half see them and i can't read them.
Are there not other copies w/o the Jose Marti edition part?

 

Dunno the significance of José Martí Edition. But here's information on Cultural S.A. which I ran through Google Translate for you. Cultural S.A. appears to have been the largest book publisher in Cuba specializing in text books.

"In the first six decades of the 20th century, most publishing houses and printing presses were private and the most technically advanced were located in Havana, although some in the provinces achieved some development. Entities emerged that, in addition to lucrative businesses, developed cultural projects of interest, such as the Contemporary Cuba Society, founder of a magazine of the same name, while many belonged to Spaniards established in the country. Among the most outstanding are, in a not strictly chronological order, Cultural S. A., the largest publishing company of the period that began the true book industry in Cuba dedicated primarily to texts for primary education."

Debora

 

Sewing must have been a national past time in Cuba as my great aunts as well as my grandma (and mom to an extent) were great sewers . Interesting book,but Id think the market for it would have be less than as most of the Cubans who would remember this or want it are dying off.

 

I dunno. Think there might be some interest in pre-revolutionary Cuban fashion. Here's a Pinterest pages dedicated to the same, for instance. And there's many collectors of vintage patterns.

https://www.pinterest.com/paigeborak/pre-castro-cuban-fashion/

Debora

 

I stand corrected then. I was basing my assumption on the fact most of my older relatives who escaped Cuba are all dead now,and the younger ones were born here so they dont have as much interest in the "homeland' .

 

Here's a class of students who would be using that manual in their course.



Debora

 

The famous folk song 'Guantanamera' takes it's lyrics from a Jose' Marti poem.

 

Thank you all!