International History Of Costume Design
While it is sometimes difficult to be sure of costume design information because the silent-film period gave designers no screen credits and, during the 1950s, the studios disposed of many records, four elements can be said to form the foundation of film costume design as it is in the early twenty-first century: the establishment of its own studio department; the freedom given to designers to create extravagantly; the influx of, and competition with, international influence; and the recognition of design as a force on fashion. Though built by emigres who had worked in the garment business (Carl Laemmle was a haberdasher, Adolph Zukor a furrier, Samuel Goldwyn a glover, and Louis B. Mayer a shoemaker), early Hollywood put little emphasis on costume. Actors used their own clothing and a woman with a better closet would get a better part. This continued well into the 1930s for men like Fred Astaire and Cary Grant who often wore their own, custom-made wardrobe. However, an initial office of costume design was inaugurated in 1915 by designer Clare West who, with two years' work on Intolerance (D. W. Griffith, 1916), attained the unprecedented credential of ''studio designer,'' raising the status of what was formerly known as ''head of wardrobe.'' At that time, ''wardrobe'' was a division of the ''drapery department,'' which bought or rented clothes or basted them together because, during the quick film productions of the 1910s, a movie outfit could be discarded after a day. As early as 1921 The Woman's Home Companion cited the ''studio designer'' as an important asset and urged stars, who still regularly wore their own clothes on screen, to tap into it. A design contract was also probably given to Peggy Hamilton who, by 1918, costumed at Triangle (D. W. Griffith's studio) and was the first to outfit Gloria Swanson. But, as with many designers of the era, she moved on within a year or so.
Cecil B. DeMille was one of the first to realize that audiences wanted extreme couture and would pay to see their fantasies on a sexy star. In 1918, knowing that her talent would ''make people gasp,'' he hired West to oversee Famous Players-Lasky's costumes. She stayed until 1925, through at least ten DeMille pictures. He encouraged lavish creativity and West's work, which fans and stars adored, helped film costume to gain greater artistic stature and to shift away from the pervading European sensibility. In the teens, dazzled producers brought in foreign artistes such as Paul Iribe (18831935) and Erte (1892-1990) to work with in-studio designers like Rambova, West, and Adrian, once the French couturier Paul Poiret's (1879-1944) outfits for France's production of Queen Elizabeth (1912) with Sarah Bernhardt, which was distributed by Paramount, opened the floodgates for ''art'' in Hollywood design. But by the 1920s, as costume design became a major component of the film industry with an expanding department and huge budgets, the Parisians lost out to the success of artistically wild, barely wearable, or eminently practical, super-styled clothing made by American costume designers, marking the beginning of an American fashion autonomy. The ''costume department'' was not truly established until the late 1920s, after which all studios had one, inevitably headed—often for decades—by a legendary designer. Some departments had different designers for female or male roles; others had a single overseer. After the 1950s' costume design renaissance with musicals, especially at MGM, the design department disappeared with the demise of the studio system, taking with it many in-house craftspeople.
Other film industries, such as those of Latin America and Asia, built their costume design on regional outfits and elaborate textile traditions. The musicals made during Mexican cinema's Golden Age (1930-1950) and the Brazilian chanchada films (1935-1959) took excessive liberties with traditional dress, which fans loved. The costumes of India's Bollywood musicals are similarly steeped in ancient tradition and equally known for adaptations. Some films are even famous for breakthrough deviations, such as Mughal-e-Azam s (1960) invention of a Rajput queen s bra-cup blouse. Typically, famous master costumers for Indian dance construct film outfits, but there are many Indian costume designers who are specific to the film industry, some of whom work internationally.
Japan 's and China's costume design also emerge out of a fabric history involving high-toned color and ornate weaves and embroideries, and their films have capitalized on this tradition. From its inception, Japan's film industry has produced popular period films. The country's first color film, Jigokumon (Gate of Hell, Teinosuke Kinugasa, 1953, Academy Award®), set in feudal Japan, was exceptionally costumed by Sanzo Wada, who also acted as color consultant. Kusune Kainosho made the costumes for the classic ghost story, Ugetsu Monogatari (Tales of Ugetsu, Kenji Mizoguchi, 1953; 1955 Academy Award® nomination). Ran (1985, Academy Award®), Akira Kurosowa's epic King Lear adaptation, was costumed to
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