Horror and Haute Couture

Art by Ariya Ramjit

Fashion has always played an important role in film. It creates depth for characters, demonstrating personality and traits. In horror movies, it works the same way, but on a deeper, more significant level. The costumes are created to be memorable, to intrigue and excite the audience. The horror films I’ve listed below are perfect examples of this, how fashion merges with story to create world building, character, and strike emotion in the heart of the audience.

Crimson Peak (2015)

Designed by Kate Hawley, this movie’s costumes are packed with symbolism and intent. Working together with the director of the film, Guillermo Del Toro, Hawley planned a wardrobe that makes every scrap of fabric brim with meaning. She utilizes colour and texture to represent character archetypes, motif, and story. For example, Edith’s clothing is all bright colours with a small accent of dark, foreboding colours. Her gleaming, yellow dress is paired with a black bow hanging from her neck. It demonstrates the contrasting nature of her values with the setting of Allerdale Hall. The amount of care and thought put into the costuming for this film cannot be overstated. Every detail comes together to make it a keen example of blending fashion with horror to create an atmospheric story that remains in your mind long after it’s finished.

Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992)

Eiko Ishioka is the mastermind behind the costumes of this iconic 90s film. Each costume is its own entity, transforming the set and production to ensure the designs are portrayed effectively and with care. Similarly to Crimson Peak, the costumes in Dracula evoke strong character design and development. Filled with symbolism, sensuality, and storytelling, each character's traits and personality manifest in their costumes, building a world that can never truly be forgotten. Dracula’s costumes are an example of this. Ishioka puts Dracula in a long, flowing robe and a huge, white wig that signifies his character’s entrapment in his current environment, and inability to escape the past.

Midsommar (2019)

The wardrobe for Midsommar was crafted by costume designer Andrea Flesch. The concept of the film’s costuming is inspired by Scandinavian culture, but is not completely drawn from it. By blending elements from multiple movements and cultures, Flesch creates an aesthetic that is unique to the film, fabricating a visual identity you can’t find elsewhere in film. The real star of the show, however, is the floral headpiece and dress Midsommar’s main character wears at the end of the movie. Filled with around 10,000 flowers, it is an extraordinary piece that makes this costume design one for the history books, where it belongs.

The Craft (1996)

Speaking of history books, Deborah Everton’s costume design in The Craft (1996) goes down as one of the most iconic film wardrobes of the era, as well as marks the start of the cult classic witchy look that is still popular to this day. While the aforementioned wardrobe designs rely on distinctive extravagant pieces and textiles, The Craft uses everyday clothing to build a set of wardrobes that continue to speak to teen girls around the world. From ornate jewellery to ahead-of-its-time layering to signature 90s hairstyles, every detail is meant to maximize the personality and performance of these girls, and it is executed flawlessly.

Jennifer’s Body (2009)

Katia Stano, the costume designer for this iconic 2000s film, used fashion to represent the central message of losing friendship and innocence in a seemingly flawless world of picture-perfect looks and popularity. The costumes are feminine, cute, and playfully sexy, meant to contrast the horrors that Jennifer’s character inflicts on the town she lives in. While not as complex as the other films listed in this ranking, this costume design still exists as a cultural touchstone of iconic campy fashion moments. It gives the audience a dream 2000s teen girl wardrobe to yearn for every time Halloween comes back around.