Ranging from the 1920s through the 1960s, this collection consists of files Jessica Rummel kept for her New York City-based interior decoration business, which operated during at least part of this period as Harding & Rummel, Inc. The files, which Rummel arranged, include small drawings, watercolors, site plans, and tracings of decorative elements, furniture, textiles, and interior layouts produced by Rummel in the course of her business.

The collection also includes vendor literature, magazine and catalog clippings, postcards, price lists, and business correspondence. Rummel was on the faculty of the New York School of Fine and Applied Art (later, Parsons The New School for Design) in the Interior Architecture and Decoration Department from 1921 through 1934.

Sherl Nero (1939-2006) was a fashion and textile designer who graduated from Parsons School of Design in 1962 and worked in sportswear design before joining the Design Works of Bedford Stuyvesant (DWBS) in 1971. DWBS was the brainchild of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and designers Doris and Leslie Tillett. With financing from the Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation, the Black-owned business produced African-inspired designs for fabrics and homewares.

This collection contains design material made by Nero at DWBS and from her work as a designer for Burlington Domestics, Aberdeen Inc., and other home textile companies. Also included is biographical material documenting Nero's achievements throughout her career and her trajectory from a fashion student at Parsons to design director for a large home textiles company.