Charlotte von Hardenburgh
Business and Liberal Arts Center, Room B629
Biography
Charlotte von Hardenburgh is a design historian and educator focusing on the underrepresented role of women within American modernism. She is currently the steward of the archive of Jewish émigré architect Fran Hosken (1919–2006). Her recent publications and lectures focus on the spring-wire jewelry that Hosken designed in the late 1940s.
Prior to her role with the Hosken Inc. Archive, von Hardenburgh was awarded the inaugural American Women’s History Initiative Research Fellowship at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. Her research contributed to the retrospective exhibition of American textile designer, Dorothy Liebes (1897 – 1972). The accompanying catalogue—published by Yale University Press—is the first-ever monographic publication about Liebes. Additionally, von Hardenburgh managed Cooper Hewitt’s digital platform. This award-winning website offers more in-depth essays on many of the projects presented in the Liebes exhibition, as well as new stories unique to the platform.
In addition to her curatorial work and teaching, von Hardenburgh was selected as the designer for the forthcoming exhibition and catalogue raisonné, More Than A Muse: The Jewelry Designs of Millicent Rogers, which opens in September 2027 in Taos, New Mexico.
von Hardenburgh teaches undergraduate courses concentrating on the histories of industrial design, graphic design, architecture, typography, and fashion.
Conferences and Presentations
In the Archive: Sketches and Swatches of Bonnie Cashin & Dorothy Liebes, Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, October 21, 2025
Dorothy Liebes & Bonnie Cashin: Textiles, Fashion & Friendship, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, September 17, 2025
The Spanish Pavilion at the NY World’s Fair 64-65, Instituto Cervantes, New York, NY, June 3, 2025
Fran Hosken—Modern Woman, NYC Jewelry Week, Weinberg Modern, New York, NY, November 2024
Fashionable Female Friendships: Dorothy Liebes, Bonnie Cashin & Helen Hughes Dulany Yale University, New Haven, CT, January 31, 2024
Dorothy Liebes: The Mystery of The Matching Cuffs, The Jewelry Library, New York, NY, September 13, 2023
A Dark, A Light, A Bright: The Designs of Dorothy Liebes, Modernism Week, Palm Springs, CA, February 22, 2023
Exhibitions
More Than A Muse: The Jewelry Designs of Millicent Rogers, Millicent Rogers Museum, Taos, NM, September 14, 2027 – January 27, 2028
CERÁMICA ‘64, Weinberg Modern, New York, NY, September 16, 2024 – October 16, 2024
A Dark, A Light, A Bright: The Designs of Dorothy Liebes, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, New York, NY, July 7, 2023 – February 5, 2024
Grants
American Women’s History Initiative Research Fellowship, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum & Archives of American Art, September 2022 – November 2023
Awards
Smithsonian Congress of Scholars, Secretary’s Research Prize for the Virtual Exhibition: A Dark, A Light, A Bright: The Designs of Dorothy Liebes, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, 2025
Museum Association of New York, Award of Distinction for the Virtual Exhibition: A Dark, A Light, A Bright: The Designs of Dorothy Liebes, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, 2024
Courses
- HA 118 Introduction to Fashion History: Materials, Motifs, and Meanings