1920's Clothing and The Oscar Nominated Film: The Artist

The Artist is not just a good film, it has some amazing garments to boot. The costume designer studied authentic 1920's dresses for the main character, as well as applied actual era pieces. A great interview on www.clothesonfilm.com discusses the process with costume designer Mark Bridges. See the quotes below from the interview:

Dress for Sale at The Way We Wore in L.A.. 1920's authentic example and an almost exact style to that worn by Preppy in the film. Image property of The Way We Wore. See at here.

As a collector and vintage seller, I run across 1920s beaded dresses in this style but many times they have damage due to their weight and the fragility of the materials. Costume designers have a hard time finding originals that will hold up.  If you check major auction houses who deal in vintage you undoubtedly will see some great examples.  Mark Bridges elaborates:


"MB: Some of the dresses used in the film were real 1920s dresses, but most had some sign of age to them or a repair so they weren’t suitable to use on Peppy. I found 1920s dresses that were great shape but very fragile and had them copied in new silks for Peppy. Even before her stardom I made Peppy’s dresses in silk crepe de chine, a kind of simple, typical fabric used at the time. Many dresses in the Sears catalogue in 1927 were very inexpensive frocks made of silk crepe. The dresses that did hold up for me to use on day players and background were usually made of cotton or light wool, but being over eighty years old, most of them had a bit of damage somewhere.

CoF: Peppy Miller’s dress for her audition at the film studio was particularly short. Did you source any twenties style dresses from later eras?

MB: Her audition dress was copied from a lovely little 1920s dress that had shoulders so small it was difficult to get on and off. The length of the original was above her knee, which I liked for this bold young woman. As far as sourcing from other periods I don’t think it works because there is always the sensibility of the decade that reinterpreted the design. If anything, with our version of the twenties, changes were made to fit better and be more flattering to Bérénice to the modern eye. I always start with the actual period dress"(Laverty, Chris).

For the full interview go to- clothes on film.