swatches

Fabric samples sent and received by Mary Alexander, a successful New York businesswoman who specialized in "haberdashery " what would today be called notions. She ordered plain as well as luxurious fabrics and sold them at her store on Broad Street in Manhattan. Mary Alexander was born in New York in 1693 and married Samuel Prevoost, an importer, with whom she ran a mercantile business. After Prevoost died around 1720 she married James Alexander, a well known attorney and politician, but continued to run the Prevoost business and became a prominent member of New York society.