Glorious! All you need to know about Cruella de Vil's fashion and wardrobe design

Director Craig Gillespie, costume designer Jenny Beavan and production designer Fiona Crombie worked together to perfect every detail for this young Cruella film. Fashion isn't just working, it's a lifestyle. "We are in a world of fashion," he says of the film. In it, we meet Emma Stone as a young girl with a dream to create her own life. 

For costume designer Jenny Beavan, this meant creating a more glamorous and desirable fashion style that had to outshine the previous film versions (with Glenn Close). With 47 outfits for Cruella and 33 outfits for the Baroness (Cruella's enemy), she has thus succeeded in a monster task. For Beavan, who already has two Oscars for "Best Costume Design" literally in her pocket, it was nevertheless the biggest project yet.

Fortunately, having spent her teenage years in 1970s London, Beaven knows the style of the decade very well. Says production designer Fiona Crombie, "This film shows a lot of the cutting edge of fashion, but beyond that, it needs a certain backdrop to tie it in." They chose London, a burgeoning punk culture, as the backdrop, while Vivienne Westwood's unique style served as inspiration for Cruella.

From this imagined world emerges a rebellious Cruella, who represents a fashion icon of the time not only in the Disney universe. The historical model, by the way, is said to have been a certain society girl named Tallulah Bankhead, described by Marlene Dietrich as "the most immoral woman in the world." Played by Emma Thompson, with a Dior-inspired aesthetic, Cruella is challenged: And with that, a conflict of greatness and style arises between the two designers.

And this is "the best part of the film," Gillespie promises because fashion is not only a form of artistic expression but also the "battle weapon" of two women that this film is meant to embody like no other. We're thinking of "epic" society rivalries similar to Helena Rubinstein vs. Elizabeth Arden.

In the early stages of the mission, Beaven scoured vintage boutiques in London, New York, and even Los Angeles to have tons of items for Emma Stone for the initial wardrobe tests. In the end, although she didn't use much of it, the process helped inspire the final costumes for Cruella's film and gave the actress a greater sense of style.

In the film, Cruella takes the iconic Baroness gown and transforms it into a completely different dress with bold punk cuts, symbolizing the current recycling trend that Chloé, for example, just featured in its new Spring/Summer 2022 collection. "I think recycling is becoming part of their fashion philosophy," Beaven says of the dress, which was inspired by Charles James' "Tree Dress" design. An iconic dress that reflects feminine confidence like no other.

Beavan was tasked with creating 1970s fashion that still somehow had to be relevant to the present. And she expresses this in a red and black dress that oozes "madness" from every pore, yet still shines with sophistication. In the process, the skirt became so expansive for the film that it covers the Baroness' car in one scene.

Beyond that, the top is a black jacket that Beaven has elaborately attached to her shoulder a miniature world with dozens of different statues. "I think there was a time when I saw 12 people sitting around the table carefully hand-embroidering the petals for this dress," Beavan says of the most time-consuming work at the Shepperton workshop in the UK.

"You have to remember that even though she's evil, she's still a very, very talented designer," Beavan noted of the Baroness character, who has a fine penchant for a striking style. Her preferred palettes differed considerably; while red is Cruella's signature color, her enemies often appear in predominantly brown, green, and yellow outfits.

Nothing ruins a daring break-in more than a boring outfit, so this look needs to be as captivating and exciting as Cruella broke into Nam's party. The outfit consisted of glittery sequin tights that contrasted with the black jacket and punk makeup, with "The Future" written in challenging graffiti across the face.

At a party of the antagonists, the Baroness, Cruella, and her gang drove a huge dump truck and start throwing away piles of rags that look like garbage. But in fact, they are the long ends of the Baroness' satin robe from the 1967 collection. She smiled proudly and disappears again, hands clasped to the car with skirts fluttering in the wind. Iconic! 

With this outfit, Beavan pays homage to the 1996 version of Cruella played by Glenn Close, but it's still an entirely different creation of the new film. During a fashion night when tensions were high between Cruella and the Baroness, Cruella appeared and created what Fiona Crombie described as a "fashion bomb" in a dalmatian gown: The signature symbol of Cruella de Vil. From here, viewers can vaguely guess the source of Cruella's obsession with dalmatian fur, but rest assured that these are all the results of the printing process on the fabric, not an animal being harmed during the making of the film. This is 2021!