Babette Pinsky

Babette

Company type	Private
Industry	Fashion, Apparel
Founded	1968
Founder	Babette Pinsky
Defunct	2016
Fate	Closed
Headquarters	Oakland, California , United States
Area served	United States (nationwide)
Key people	Babette Pinsky, Steven Pinsky, Josephine Tchang
Products	Women's apparel

Babette Pinsky is an American fashion designer recognized for her eponymous upscale women's apparel line, Babette, which was designed and manufactured in Oakland, California. This brand was distributed nationwide through department stores, boutique retailers, and a dedicated chain of Babette outlets. The enterprise was co-owned and operated by Pinsky alongside her husband, Steven Pinsky, until its closure in 2016.

Early life and education

Pinsky was born and raised in New York City. Her given name, Babette, reflects her French maternal heritage. She completed her studies at the Fashion Institute of Technology before relocating to San Francisco in 1968 with her first spouse.

Career

The Babette label was launched by Pinsky in 1968. Steven Pinsky became involved with the company starting in 1990. Initially, the pleated textiles used in her designs were produced by a San Francisco-based pleating workshop, which the Pinskys acquired in 1995. Subsequently, operations expanded to a larger production site in Oakland, California, where Pinsky created and assembled garments within a 25,000-square-foot facility located on the second floor of a West Grand Avenue building in West Oakland. The workforce included ten seamstresses and other specialists such as master pleater Leung Tang, who immigrated from Hong Kong.

Babette's collections were available in numerous department stores and boutiques nationwide as well as through standalone Babette stores situated in cities including San Francisco, Manhattan, Chicago, San Jose, Washington, D.C., and Minneapolis. By 2014, the brand operated nine retail locations under its name.

Pinsky’s hallmark was a distinctive accordion-style pleating technique that was heat-set into microfiber fabrics. As the brand developed, co-designer Josephine Tchang contributed to the collections. Individual garments often featured up to three distinct types of pleats.

According to San Francisco Chronicle fashion editor Sylvia Rubin, Pinsky—alongside designer Issey Miyake—played a pivotal role in revitalizing the Fortuny pleat during the 1980s. Rubin noted that Pinsky utilized a variety of pleat forms including Fortuny pleats, knife pleats, cube pleats, flower pleats, chevron pleats, box pleats, or combinations thereof within her designs.

Among Pinsky's notable creations from the 1980s is an intricately pleated raincoat featuring an architectural trapezoidal silhouette and a metallic finish.

In 2008, the Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis hosted a special exhibition showcasing Pinsky’s design work.