costumes

Rare Darth Vader Costume Going Up for Auction

Filed under: Auctions

A very rare and original Darth Vader costume, created for the epic Star Wars movie franchise, is going up on the auction block next month. The costume includes the iconic helmet, mask, and shoulder armor that helped make the character one of the most infamous and recognizable in movie history. It's thought to have been created for the second Star Wars film, "The Empire Strikes Back," in 1980 and is expected to sell for as much as $365,000. The current owner, a private American collector, obtained the costume back in 2003 and it will soon change hands again.

The costume will lead off Christie's pop culture auction in London on November 25th and represents the first complete costume to ever be offered at auction.

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Tags: costumes, darth vader, movies, star wars

Ultimate Halloween Costume: Be The King for a Day

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Apparel

Looking for the ultimate Halloween costume? If you've got the attitude to pull it off Elvis Presley is always a good choice and few costumes do it up as glamorously as this one. Although not officially an Elvis outfit (it's named simply "King Rock Star" on the website) its inspiration is clear. Fully lined in red silk, this white jumpsuit features detailed bead work in red, white and gold as well as an enormous eagle flying on the back and two smaller ones perched on each arm. It also has golden chain details on each hip and side-slit flare legs. Just add pompadour and swagger. $1600

Via bLavish

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Tags: costumes, elvis, elvis presley, halloween, halloween costumes

Museum Seeks Money To Repair Scarlett O'Hara's Gowns

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

In the 1939 movie "Gone With The Wind," Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara famously flirts with Clark Gable's Rhett Butler while wearing a dress made from her mother's curtains. But now those curtains are in need of mending. The Harry Ransom Center in Austin, Texas is home to five dresses worn by the actress Vivian Leigh in the movie including Scarlett O'Hara's Green Velvet Curtain Dress. The costumes are currently in such fragile condition that they cannot currently be exhibited.

The Center is raising money to help restores the costumes in time for a major exhibition celebrating the 75th anniversary of Gone With The Wind in 2014. The other dresses includes the figure-hugging burgundy gown she wears to Ashley Wilkes' birthday party, the wedding dress from when she married Charles Hamilton, a blue velvet peignoir and a green velvet dressing gown. The Center also wants to be able to loan the dresses to other museums around the world and is raising money for both restoration and protective housing for shipping. The center is hoping to raise $30,000 to restore five of Scarlett O'Hara's dresses.

[via Austin Business Journal]

Tags: costumes, costumes in films, gone with the wind, scarlett ohara

Explore Stratford's Giant Costume Warehouse

by Alison Wellner (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Apparel, Luxury Travel & Hotels

If you loved to play dress up when you were a kid, or you still do, or you're a theater geek -- and let's face it, all of these categories often overlap -- do yourself a favor and sign up for a tour of the Stratford Shakespeare Festival's Costume and Props Warehouse in Stratford, Ontario, Canada.

This is one of the largest costume warehouses in the world, housing more than 50,000 items worn during shows staged over the years in the annual festival, which runs through October. Nota bene, this is a guided tour -- you're not allowed to run willy nilly down the aisles marked "men's jackets, medieval" or "ladies' coats, 90s", nor are you allowed to rummage through a plastic box marked "glitzy ruffs".

You're also not allowed to touch the costumes, which is more of a serious challenge than you might think, although you are allowed to take pictures. After you tour the prop section (and learn that what stands in for blood on stage is a combination of beet root and cocoa powder -- good to know) you are released into a special area where -- yes! -- you may try on selected costumes to your heart's content. And there are hats. The number of images uploaded to Facebook over the course of a season from this part of the warehouse must be unfathomable.

Tags: costumes, shakespeare, Stratford, tours

The History of Women's Fashions on Display at the Met

by Bobbie Leigh (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Apparel, Events, Art

The 18-inch waisted-women in the first gallery of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City's stunning new show, American Woman: Fashioning a National Identity , are the great-grandmothers of the sexy screen sirens in the last. On view through August 15, this Costume Institute exhibition presents high-end women's fashions from the 1890s to the 1940s. Visitors walk through darkened circular galleries that reflect the decor and style of a feminine archetype from a particular era. Each gallery has a label starting with the "heiress" era when high fashion meant French haute couture.

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Tags: costumes, glamour, metropolitan museum of art, movie stars

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Black Lace Eyes from Tokyo Lash Bar 2008

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cosmetics and Fragrance

Shu Uemura has paired up with fashion designers Victor & Rolf to create what can only be described as an outrageously fun collection of false eyelashes that's part of their Tokyo Lash Bar 2008. The Victor & Rolf "Couture Collection" consists of three pairs of lashes called Swirl Couture, Wing Couture, and Rhombus Couture that sell for $95 a pair, and other lashes in this year's group are even more fun and sell for slightly less -- like these black lace lashes and velvet feather lashes for $50 each.

Give you any Halloween ideas? The lashes just might enough costume all on their own.

Via bloomacious

Gallery: Shu Uemura Designer Fantasy Lashes

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Tags: costume, costumes, eyelashes, halloween, lashes, victor and rolf, victor rolf, VictorAndRolf, VictorRolf

Bobbie Nudie, 1913-2006

by Nicole Weston (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Apparel

Bobbie Nudie, woman who started Nudie's Rodeo Tailors, passed away last week. She and her husband, Nudie Cohn, designed clothes for celebrities from Elvis Presley to Arnold Schwarzenegger, including famous outfits like Elvis's gold lame suit, and put hundreds and thousands of rhinestones on the clothes of country singers everywhere. Their remarkable costumes, which were made to suit their motto that "it is better to be looked over than overlooked," are highly collectible today and sell for upwards of $1000 when in good condition.