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Operating officially from 1898-1958, Chic Parisien / Bachwitz AG was one of the most renowned of the Bachwitz family's publishing endeavors to operate out of the Palais des Beaux Arts building in Vienna. Initiated by Arnold Bachwitz, who died of natural causes in 1930 in Vienna, the publishing house was handled primarily by himself, his wife Rosine, and their daughters until the rise of National Socialism. In 1938, after Austria was annexed into the German Third Reich, the administrative board of the company fell under the rule of the Nuremberg Race Laws and underwent Aryanization. As a result of this seizure, the board – comprised mostly of the Bachwitz family – was replaced, their publishing rights to several fashion magazines revoked. At the end of the war, the German Labor Front was the publishing house’s main shareholder until the company became the property of the Republic of Austria, existing only on paper until it was finally dissolved in 1958.

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Distributed internationally on a quarterly release schedule, Chic Parisien featured looks that focused on promoting lifestyles and garments, collaging tropes from a global imaginary. After a great deal of research, it's still unclear whether the hand-colored illustrations were meant to function as inspiration or if the clothing could be made to order.

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For the collection of the PdBA, artist and fashion designer Dalia Hassan (Studio Hassan) will work with Atelier Bachwitz’s Chic Parisien as a starting point for a series of fashion prototypes. Existing outside of the commercial fashion realm, “Wet Baggage” aims to document Hassan’s research into the designs of Chic Parisien while exploring the ways in which identity and alienation are expressed not only in the clothing we cover ourselves in, but also the objects we choose to carry along with us.

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