 His department store was the first American "haute couture" boutique to introduce weekly fashion shows, and the first to host concurrent art exhibitions at the store itself.In 1939, he established the annual Christmas Catalogue, which in 1951 offered the first of its extravagant "His & Hers Gifts," starting with a matching pair of vicuña coats, and going on to include matching bathtubs, a pair of Beechcraft airplanes, "Noah's Ark" (including pairs of animals), camels, and live tigers.For all his professional emphasis on glitz and glamour, he made another, very different mark on the American fashion industry when he was asked to join the War Production Board in Washington, D.C. on December 27, 1941, less than three weeks after the United States entered World War II.