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oday we decided to get out of the house and make our annual pilgrimage to the 27th Motion Picture Costume Design Exhibition at the FIDM Museum and enjoy the sunny weather in Downtown Los Angeles. First impressions? From a purely historical perspective, there wasn’t a lot going on this year. However, that said, there was a variety of exciting designs and being able to view the costumes up close in person was fascinating.

First up, are two from the movie Aquaman:

 

This is completely outside of what we do but just the combination of colors caught our eye and they definitely suggest an ocean environment. And speaking of color, here’s a gown from Ocean’s Eight:

The magenta/pink dress color just screams “shocking” in the Schiaparelli tradition and it’s a visual treat to look at. The combination gown with cape is amazing and it’s definitely an eye-catcher. The embroidery was especially striking although we were unable to get a close view of the train. Here’s some more:

Just for contrast, here’s another exquisite gown from the movie but only in shades of green:

The display lighting washes out the shades of green somewhat but trust me, in person they are deep jewel tones and the contrast between the magenta/pink of the first gown and this one is amazing.

Shifting gears a bit, we came across the Old West in the form of several outfits from The Ballad of Buster Scruggs:

In contrast to Ocean’s Eight, the wardrobe here is down to earth, practical, and perfectly fitting with the Old West, with the exception of Buster Scrugg’s outfit which was meant to stand out larger than life.

And then for something a bit more fantastical, there are these outfits from the remake of Mary Poppins Returns:

Because the lighting wasn’t the best, here’s a better view of this outfit that we lifted off the net:

And then there’s this outfit:

The styles are certainly interesting, more of an Edwardian “esq” style that anything that’s necessary period correct but hey, it’s meant to be fantastical so there you are. In keeping with the fantastical nature of the movie, here’s some more:

And just for completeness, the costume sketch:

At first, we weren’t sure of what we were looking at- much of the detail on these two outfits was actually painted on, especially for the  women’s dress where all the ruffles are actually painted on. Really! It fooled us at first. After doing a little research, we found out that these were part of an animated/live action musical number in the movie (we haven’t actually seen the movie so we apologize for any omissions). Finally one style note on the above women’s dress- it’s actually more reminiscent of a 1880s style than Edwardian. 🙂

Finally, we conclude with this simple walking outfit from Colette:

Probably the most “historical” of the outfits we viewed (that fits into the 19th Century) and it’s the quintessential day outfit characteristic circa 1900. Here it is from the movie itself, at least for the jacket and skirt:

This has been a somewhat subjective account of our excursion and we freely admit that with the exception of The Ballad of Buster Scruggs and Colette, we haven’t seen any of the other movies but we fully intend to in the future. Hopefully 2019 will see some more period pieces released. 🙂