Levi’s® Spring Bottom pants are a most fascinating garment. Introduced in 1889 they are essentially… Where to start with Penny Rose? Pirates of the Caribbean? Evita? King Arthur? Most recently… Catch up with the costume gossip you’ve missed. Godzilla “Contemporary in design with a multitude… NO SPOILERS Real and mythological, figurative and literal; monsters of all kinds abound in Sky… Some costume links to delight and amuse. Game of Thrones A preview of Daenerys’ ‘cruel… The top half of Ben Affleck’s new Batsuit has been revealed, as created by costume… Two weeks of costume stories. Sheena Napier DTSFT cover this prolific costume designer’s chat at… SPOILERS Despite all the hoo-ha…

Part two of our essay looking at sartorial identity in Sons of Anarchy, featuring exclusive insight from series costume designer Kelli Jones. Catch up with part 1 HERE. The women of SAMCRO include porn stars and pole dancers, but the club matriarch is Gemma played by Katey Sagal, formerly known as Peg Bundy in Married with Children. Gemma is the Queen of this world so her look is regal rock chick, “to make her look badass without looking like a slut. This sexy mama bitch doesn’t need to TRY” costume designer Kelli Jones says. With her background in music (she has performed with the likes of Bette Midler, Gene Simmons…

In addition to script, acting and direction, the most iconic moments in some of the best-loved films are defined in no small part by costume. This can most certainly be said of Dirty Dancing (1987) in that classic scene where “Nobody puts Baby in a corner” Johnny Castle’s (Patrick Swayze) half-unbuttoned black shirt and equally rebellious leather jacket with up-turned collar define him as the bad boy ‘your Daddy would never approve of’, whilst Baby (Jennifer Grey) wears a floaty, pale pink dress that gives her the grace of a ballerina and the elegance of a dove reflecting her much purer nature. But beyond these best known ensembles by costume…

HBO’s five part adaptation of Mildred Pierce starring Kate Winslet debuted 25th June on Sky Atlantic. A prevalent theme in the first episode is how domestic costume, specifically the housedress, can be read as a signal for sexual availability. Mildred Pierce (Winslet) is abandoned by her husband at the start of the story and left to bring up her two daughters alone during America’s Great Depression. At present there is little cause for Mildred to choose anything other than rudimentary housedresses. As costumed by Ann Roth, Winslet wears three such dresses in total. One is calf length in brown floral crepe, belted with long slashed sleeves and high round neckline.…

What young girl doesn’t want to be in the ‘Pink Ladies’ after seeing Grease (1978)? They are synonymous by their satin-lined powder pink baseball-style jacket, ‘Pink Ladies’ embroidered in black scrawl on the reverse, their name on the front, worn mostly with the collar up for that rebellious touch. Celebrating impurity, they are one of the most popular and imitated girl gangs on screen. Being ‘pink’ is a sarcastic and perhaps sexual allusion. Specialist websites suggest for a Pink Lady we need their jacket and a poodle skirt, but what do the girls really wear and why? Rizzo, the Pink Ladies’ leader, is studied HERE, with this article focusing on…

The green suit worn by Tippi Hedren as Melanie Daniels in The Birds (1963) has become increasingly symbolic in recent years as we delve ever deeper into the semiotics of film. In this case it is hardly surprising as Hedren only wears three costumes in total; the suit is so visible we cannot fail to draw meaning from its presence. But what was director Alfred Hitchcock trying to say with it, and more importantly, why? If you visited the V&A’s Hollywood Costume exhibition (now closed in London but moved to Australia and the U.S.), seeing The Birds’ suit would likely have stuck in your mind. It was given prominent placing…

‘Fashion in Film’ by Christopher Laverty – available now. Clothes on Film was launched by me, Christopher Laverty, in June, 2009. It’s intention was and remains to celebrate the art (or craft? There’s a future debate) of costume design in film and television. I have always been interested in costume design, though apart from a brief stint in theatre, I’ve never practically worked in the field. My knowledge is all theoretical and analytical. I am very lucky to have met, interviewed and can call friend some of the best and brightest costume designers in the business. I have learned so much about what the process involves and continue to do…

All the Clothes on Film posts in a big long list – scroll down there’s loads – or you can search via keyword in the box below. Older posts may have been attacked by the typo monster. The Suits of Lee Marvin in Point Blank (1967) Jane Fonda and the Costumes of Klute (1971) The Pure Nerd-Joy of Mysterio’s Costume in Spider-Man: Far From Home You’ve Got Red on You: Us and the Jumpsuit Question The Little Drummer Girl: A Colourful Pretence Shifting Trends: Claire Foy in First Man A Star is Born: The Cotton Rebel Deena Appel on the Costume Design of Austin Powers: Goldmember Deena Appel on Creating…

By no means intended as an exhaustive list, Clothes on Film ponder an overview of 2011 in costume. Concentrating on mainstream fare that those outside of big cities are likely to have seen, we consider which costumes delighted, surprised and best of all, enlightened us. Expect to spot Drive, Melancholia and Hugo on this list somewhere. Costume encompasses every item of clothing worn on film. By strict definition costume is not ‘wardrobe’; wardrobe is what Oprah Winfrey wore on her talk show. While at Clothes on Film we embrace all forms of costume, we do have a slight bias for contemporary, although only because it is often underrepresented in the…

He is the whitest of the white trash, the kind of man who dumps raw sewage in a storm drain and kidnaps your boss as a Christmas present. And the only man to ever combine a leather belt with a bathrobe. Randy Quaid has played lovable moocher ‘Cousin Eddie’ in four separate National Lampoon films, but his most famous performance still resides at yuletide. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989, directed by Jeremiah C. Chechik) has weathered years of apathy to become something of a seasonal favourite. Watching Chevy Chase’s bipolar family man Clark Griswold lose his rag every December is now a festive tradition . Yet Clark is not really…