Eleanor Lambert Berkson (August 10, 1903 – October 7, 2003) was a central figure in the American fashion and public relations industries.
Lambert was born in Crawfordsville, Indiana. She attended the John Herron School of Art and the Chicago Art Institute to study fashion. Lambart wanted to be a sculptor but went into advertising. She started at an advertising agency in Manhattan, dealing mostly with artists and art galleries.
She was married twice, firstly to Wills Conner, in the 1920s, which ended in divorce and secondly to Seymour Berkson in 1936, which ended with his death in 1959. Eleanor and Seymour had one son together, the renowned poet Bill Berkson. She died in Manhattan in New York City.
In the mid 1930s, Lambert was the first Press Director of the Whitney Museum of American Art and helped with the founding of the Museum of Modern Art.Jackson Pollock, Jacob Epstein, and Isamu Noguchi were a few of the many artists she represented.
In the 1940s, Lambert founded the International Best Dressed List, the Coty Fashion Critics’ Award (in 1943), and New York Fashion Week. In 1959 and 1967, she was asked by the US Department of State to present American fashion for the first time in Russia, Germany, Italy, Australia, Japan, Britain, and Switzerland.
Eleanor Lambert is a former South Africa and Natal Test cricketer. She appeared, opening the batting and keeping wicket, in South Africa's first Test match in 1960 against the touring England team. She scored 12 runs in the first-innings, and improved to 34 in the second as South Africa drew the match. Opening again in the second Test, she could only manage 2 runs in the first-innings, and with South Africa following on, 17 runs in the second. She didn't appear in the last two Tests of the series, and was not to play for the Springboks again.