Roland Kavé’s Ruffled Mambo Sleeves

Between 1950 and 1970

These ruffled sleeves shimmy and shimmer on the arms of a mambo dancer. The seven-layered sleeves repeat a pattern of black, gold lamé, and red fabric, with black on both elasticized ends. Mambo emerged from Afro-Cuban jazz in the 1940s and flourished in Mexico City and New York City in the 1950s. Dance leader Roland Kavé (1931-2017) introduced mambo to Washington, DC, donning these sleeves in performance during its peak popularity in the 1950s and 1960s. The native Washingtonian, known as DC’s “Mambo King,” taught hundreds of people to mambo on U Street Corridor dance floors, including the Casbah and the Tropical Room in the Dunbar Hotel.