The Oscars are about to provide yet another dazzling showcase for the Lebanese designer Elie Saab, Julia Robson meets the couturier with Hollywood at his door.
Dressed by Saab: Halle Berry (Oscars, 2002); Kate Winslet (Emmys, 2011); Gwyneth Paltrow (Bambi awards, 2011); Bérénice Bejo, star of The Artist (Baftas, 2012). PHOTOS: REX/CORBIS
Two words are synonymous with red-carpet fashion these days: Elie Saab. Rarely a week goes by without a beautiful celebrity wearing an exquisite, twinkling creation by the 47-year-old Lebanese designer at an awards ceremony or starry premiere. Remember the curvaceous, crimson-hued, cap-sleeved gown Kate Winslet wore to collect her Emmy last September? It was an Elie Saab (a copy now graces the waxwork Winslet at Madame Tussauds). And the emerald-sequined ‘mermaid’ gowns Gwyneth Paltrow and Zoe Saldana wore on the same night in November to functions on either side of the Atlantic? Elie Saab.In the past year the roll-call of leading ladies who have chosen Saab’s fluttering chiffon or billowing satin to wear on the red carpet has trebled.
Lebanese designer Elie Saab waves after the presentation of his Women’s spring/summer 2012 Haute Couture fashion collection in Paris. PHOTO: AP Read more…
Eye on the Oscars: Art Direction, Costume Designers & Makeup
FIDM’s Meghan Hansen installs Peppy Miller’s dress from ‘The Artist.’
For 20 years, costume designers, some of whom were nominated for an Oscar on Jan. 24, have found their work on display at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising in downtown Los Angeles. The groundwork for securing the costumes starts a year in advance as FIDM Museum director Barbara Bundy and her staff curate the display after watching movies and trailers. Some of the costumes have been rented, some recycled for other productions and with so many projects from around the globe meriting inclusion, the staff has to move early before costumes are scattered to the winds once production ends. Costume Designer Oscar nominees displayed in the LA fashion district in downtown Los Angeles. FIDM Institute of Fashion Design and Merchandising School, has produced several notable designers over the years. The show is also hosted by the Costume Designers Guild of professionals. – - read more in Variety.com By Shalini Dore
This is Powell’s 10th Oscar nomination. She has won the costume design award three times, including for Scorsese’s Howard Hughes biopic,“The Aviator.” The opportunity to work again with the director, a frequent collaborator, was a major motivation for her to sign on to the lavish 3-D family movie, but so was its source material, the illustrated children’s novel “The Invention of Hugo Cabret.” The Oscar nominations were announced early Tuesday morning, but the day was heading into night in England, where costume designer Sandy Powell ended up learning the news of her Academy Award nod for Martin Scorsese’s “Hugo” while she was stuck in traffic. “I was in a car being driven by a friend in a traffic jam on a rainy London afternoon,” Powell said. “David [Davenport], my [costume] supervisor, sent me a message saying, ‘You better start looking for a dress!’” - – more
Highlights: Oscar nominations doesn’t necessarily mean an Award but it’s close. Sandy Powell a seasoned Costume Designer has brought the art of Costume Design to a level of greatness. Other nominees for films like War Horse Steven Spielberg’s epic, The Descendants with George Clooney, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Hugo directed by Martin Scorsesse, are all a shoe for the Academy Awards. Hollywood’s Kodak Theatre has been playing host for the presentations in the past few years where winners like SOCIAL NETWORK, THE KING’S SPEECH and BABLE enjoyed being honored. Just think, back when it all started the Hollywood Roosevelt was host. Now it’s a great part of Oscar History. Don’t forget the many other categories: Art Direction, Best Supporting Actress, Best Actress Oscar and so on. Film Schools in LA are now very prevalent and talent from all over the globe go there waiting for their day in the sun. French actors, British actors and of course our American actors all await being an Oscar Winner whether they admit or not. Period costumes for The Silent Film “The Artist” inspired great artistry and performance by a great assortment of Talent from various parts of the World. Wow…good Old Hollywood!
Women still hanker after the simple black dress worn by Audrey Hepburn as Holly Golightly in the 1961 film Breakfast at Tiffany’s. And, millions of other ensembles seen on the big screen continue to influence fashion. Now recognizing the power of the Hollywood costume, a major exhibition will showcase more than a hundred of the most memorable wares for the first time. Items such as Dorothy’s blue and white gingham pinafore dress from The Wizard of Oz, and Scarlett O’Hara’s green ‘curtain’ gown worn in Gone with the Wind will be displayed alongside items from more recent releases including Consolata Boyle’s costumes for Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady. The exhibition, launching at the V&A this October, has taken more than five years to pull together. Clothing was sourced from across the world and has been borrowed from costume houses, museums, film studios and private collectors. A Footnote: Hollywood studios focus on the designers interpretation of the natural history of scripts. Los Angeles County has long been a haven for film production in California. Studios like Warner Bros have long featured the work of the Costume Designer in many film production movies and previews. Edith Head always stands out as a pioneer in breaking down the costume plot with emphasis on historical costumes for the hollywood film. It was pure genius what she accomplished. Fashion design schools more and more are introducing Costume Design as a major. The American Film Industry by far is a part of a staple of good film making, Internationally. The costume designer jobs have been celebrated by the Academy Awards since its inception. Even Independent film makers relish the Costume Designer in the movie business as well as Major Film Studios. Oscar nominations doesn’t necessarily mean an Award but it’s close. Sandy Powell a seasoned Costume Designer has brought the art of Costume Design to a level of greatness. This years oscar nominees for films like War Horse Steven Spielberg’s epic, The Descendants with George Clooney, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Hugo directed by Martin Scorsesse, are all a shoe for the Academy Awards. Hollywood’s Kodak Theatre has been playing host for the presentations in the past few years where winners like SOCIAL NETWORK, THE KING’S SPEECH and THE SOCIAL NETWORK were all costume design contenders. Just think, back when it all started the Hollywood Roosevelt was host. Now it’s a great part of Oscar History. Don’t forget the many other categories: Art Direction, Best Supporting Actress, Best Actress Oscar and so on. Film Schools in LA are now very prevalent and talent from all over the globe go there waiting for their day in the sun. French actors, British actors and of course our American actors all await being an Oscar Winner whether they admit or not. Period costumes for The Silent Film “The Artist” inspired great artistry and performance by a great assortment of Talent from various parts of the World. Wow…good Old Hollywood! – - Read more
My hat goes off to Arianne Phillips and her spot on costume designs for the film. Phillips, who recieved an Academy Award Nomination for “Walk the Line” (2005), and was responsible for the tailored looks of Tom Ford’s “A Single Man” (2009), as well as taking care of Madonna’s costumes for both “The Confessions”, and the “Sticky & Sweet” tours, does an amazing job at recreating the glamour and decadence of the famous couple.
Costume designers often labor over the script, the production concept and they spend hours and hours hunting down fabrics as well as drawing and physically, creating wearable works of art. A character’s costume can give clues to the ‘Era (History of Fashion)’ the movie is set in, the age of the character, their station in life, their mood, their personality and their relationship with the other characters. The reel below is a sample of some of this years Nominated movies. You can follow this article in order to get a List of some Nominees and Winners of the Past. Historically, past Oscars have recognized many costume designers for their hard work. Many of these artist have done a great deal to create the world of the film through fashion.| Read more…..!
Read More from the speakers featured in this week’s Fishko Files…
Fashion and costume designer Bob Mackie has designed for icons such as Diana Ross, Cher and Liza Minnelli. The “sultan of sequins,” as Mackie’s sometimes called, has received nine Emmy Awards and three Academy Award nominations.
Costume Designer and costume design historian Deborah Nadoolman Landis created Michael Jackson’s red Thriller jacket (1983) and Harrison Ford’s iconic fedora and jacket for Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), among other famous costumes. She is the David C. Copley Chair, and Director of the Copley Center for Costume Design at the UCLA School of Theater, Film & Television. Her most recent book is Dressed: A Century of Hollywood Costume Design.
The nominees for best costume design created a variety of looks, including nineteenth century western apparel and avant-garde Elizabethan garb. Let’s meet the five women who made the cut for this year’s Costume Design category.
The actor was dressed in ‘playful but still traditional’ garb, which included a custom hat made from imported Italian leather woven with gold threads that was sized to fit his fluffy orange wig. ‘He’s a real person with a great amount of heart in the story, so to have him running around in something that distracted from that would have been a mistake,” Atwood told WWD.
Time spent in the North Dakota landscape of endless light-dappled cornfields fueled Kate and Laura Mulleavy with a vision for their poetic collection.
“It was based on the Great American Plains, on Days of Heaven,” said Kate Mulleavy, referring to Terrence Malick’s haunting 1978 movie set in the Texas Panhandle at harvest time, for which Néstor Almendros’s cinematography won an Academy Award (“I loved the golden hour light,” said Sofia Coppola of the show). The collection —dreamy, ethereal, unexpected—might have been made for Coppola’s muse Kirsten Dunst, who sighed in the front row.
The Mulleavys wanted their collection to reflect “a study of natural light in that landscape—telling a story of the sun rising and setting, from dawn to dusk….”
At FIDM’s preview of “The Art of Motion Picture Costume Design,” two-time Academy Award-winningcostume designerColleen Atwood said Johnny Depp wanted his Mad Hatter costume to capture the flavor of a mood ring. So she layered his topcoat with multiple colors of silk. Standing beside her costume from “Alice in Wonderland,” Atwood said the challenges of designing for Depp, Anne Hathaway, Mia Wasikowska and Helena Bonham Carter included the changing sizes of the characters. “Alice shrinks and grows, and Helena’s big head made her neck look as thick as a thigh,” Atwood said, adding that she solved that problem by creating a collar to narrow the appearance of Bonham Carter’s neck.
Subscribe Here
Dressed by Saab: Halle Berry (Oscars, 2002); Kate Winslet (Emmys, 2011); Gwyneth Paltrow (Bambi awards, 2011); Bérénice Bejo, star of The Artist (Baftas, 2012). PHOTOS: REX/CORBIS
Recent Comments