Adorable Story #25: Joan "Tiger" Morse

A Roar in the Fashion Jungle

“If you want to look like a million dollars, come to A La Carte and bring a million dollars.”

— Joan “Tiger” Morse

Tiger Morse at her A La Carte Boutique in 1964 — © Slim Aarons / Getty Images

Joan “Tiger” Morse was a dynamic, trailblazing figure in the fashion industry of the 1960s. Her flamboyant and colorful designs, combined with her larger-than-life personality, made her a trendsetter in an era defined by innovation and breaking boundaries.

Early Life and Career

Joan “Tiger” Morse was born to a Jewish family in New York City on April 23, 1931: her father, the Russian-born Henry Sugarman, was a prominent architect, who designed the New Yorker Hotel.

The family was quite well-to-do and she grew up in sophisticated and wealthy environs: with her family, she lived at The Meurice, a luxurious residential hotel close to Central Park and, after graduating from the prestigious Cherry Lawn boarding school in Darien, Connecticut, she later attended Syracuse University and then the Sorbonne in Paris.

Tiger Morse in the studio — © Mark Shaw

Later called “La Passionaria of the dropout subculture,” in the 50s she began working as a “fairly conventional” stylist and started making “slightly quirky clothes.”

In 1955, she opened A La Carte, the first of what became a string of boutiques in New York City: she traveled the world to find fabrics for her designs, accessories to sell, and pieces which “would amuse her friends.”

Among her first clients, ladies like Jackie Bouvier and Jean Vanderbilt were noted.

Jackie Kennedy wears a black and white wool sleeveless dress purchased from Joan “Tiger” Morse’s Manhattan boutique, A La Carte, as she leaves The Carlyle Hotel in New York City on June 2, 1962 — © New York Daily News Archive / Getty Images