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And the Oscar for Best Costume Design Goes to …
74 Years of Oscar-Winning Costume Designs: A Visual
Contents
Current Winner of the Academy Award for Best Costume Design
Cruella (2021)
Set in the 1970s
Jenny Beavan
No one would obey a supreme ruler wearing a plastic crown—or believe an actor portraying one on the big screen. That’s why in 1948, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences created an Oscar Award for excellence in costume design.
The Academy has awarded 92 Oscars for costume design since then, the most recent being the fashion-focused film Cruella. To celebrate the winner of this year’s show—and all prior winners—our talented designers at USDISH recreated iconic Oscar-winning costumes from the past.
Check out Oscar-winning films of past and present with DISH On Demand, included with all America’s Top packages from DISH.
Winners of the Academy Award for Best Costume Design
From 2000 to 2020
Winners of the Academy Award for Best Costume Design
From 2000 to 2020
Winners of the Academy Award for Best Costume Design
From the 1940s to the 1990s
The Academy gave the first Oscar for best costume design in 1948. For most years until 1967, it awarded color and black-and-white films separately, resulting in two costume design Oscar winners.
1940s Oscar-winning costume designs
- Hamlet (1948)* | Set in the 1300s | Roger K. Fuse
- Joan of Arc (1948) | Set in the 1500s | Dorothy Jeakins & Barbara Karinska
- The Heiress (1949)* | Set in the 1800s | Edith Head & Gile Steele
- Adventures of Don Juan (1949) | Set in the 1440s | Leah Rhodes, William Travilla & Marjorie Best
*Winner in the black-and-white film category
1950s Oscar-winning costume designs
- All About Eve (1950)* | Set in the 1940s | Edith Head & Charles LeMaire
- Samson and Delilah (1950) | Set in biblical times | Edith Head, Dorothy Jeakins, Elois Jenssen, Gile Steele & Gwen Wakeling
- A Place in the Sun (1951)* | Set in the 1950s | Edith Head
- An American in Paris (1951) | Set in the 1940s | Orry-Kelly, Walter Plunkett & Irene Sharaff
- The Bad and the Beautiful (1952)* | Set in the 1930s | Helen Rose
- Moulin Rouge (1952) | Set in the 1890s | Marcel Vertès
- Roman Holiday (1953)* | Set in the 1950s | Edith Head
- The Robe (1953) | Set in 32 AD | Charles LeMaire & Emile Santiago
- Sabrina (1954)* | Set in the 1950s | Edith Head
- Gate of Hell (1954) | Set in the 1160s | Sanzo Wada
- I’ll Cry Tomorrow (1955)* | Set in the 1950s | Helen Rose
- Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955) | Set in the 1940s | Charles LeMaire
- The Solid Gold Cadillac (1956)* | Set in the 1950s | Jean Louis
- The King and I (1956) | Set in the 1850s | Irene Sharaff
- Les Girls (1957) | Set in the 1950s | Orry-Kelly
- Gigi (1958) | Set in the 1900s | Cecil Beaton
- Some Like It Hot (1959)* | Set in the 1920s | Orry-Kelly
- Ben-Hur (1959) | Set in 26 AD | Elizabeth Haffenden
*Winner in the black-and-white film category
1960s Oscar-winning costume designs
- The Facts of Life (1960)* | Set in the 1960s | Edith Head & Edward Stevenson
- Spartacus (1960) | Set in the 70s BC | Valles & Bill Thomas
- La Dolce Vita (1960)* | Set in the 1960s | Piero Gherardi
- West Side Story (1961) | Set in the 1960s | Irene Sharaff
- What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)* | Set in the 1940s | Norma Koch
- The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (1962) | Set in the 1900s | Mary Wills
- 8½ (1963)* | Set in the 1950s | Piero Gherardi
- Cleopatra (1963) | Set in 48 BC | Renié, Vittorio Nino Novarese & Irene Sharaff
- The Night of the Iguana (1964)* | Set in the 1960s | Dorothy Jeakins
- My Fair Lady (1964) | Set in the 1910s | Cecil Beaton
- Darling (1965)* | Set in the 1960s | Julie Harris
- Doctor Zhivago (1965) | Set in the 1900s | Phyllis Dalton
- Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)* | Set in the 1960s | Irene Sharaff
- A Man for All Seasons (1966) | Set in the 1500s | Elizabeth Haffenden & Joan Bridge
- Camelot (1967) | Set in the 1400s | John Truscott
- Romeo and Juliet (1968) | Set in the 1300s | Danilo Donati
- Anne of the Thousand Days (1969) | Set in the 1500s | Margaret Furse
*Winner in the black-and-white film category
1970s Oscar-winning costume designs
- Cromwell (1970) | Set in the 1600s | Vittorio Nino Novarese
- Nicholas and Alexandra (1971) | Set in the 1910s | Yvonne Blake & Antonio Castillo
- Travels with My Aunt (1972) | Set in the 1970s | Anthony Powell
- The Sting (1973) | Set in the 1960s | Edith Head
- The Great Gatsby (1974) | Set in the 1920s | Theoni V. Aldredge
- Barry Lyndon (1975) | Set in the 1700s | Milena Canonero & Ulla-Britt Sӧderlund
- Fellini’s Casanova (1976) | Set in the 1700s | Danilo Donati
- Star Wars (1977) | Set in 0 ABY | John Mollo
- Death on the Nile (1978) | Set in the 1930s | Anthony Powell
- All That Jazz (1979) | Set in the 1970s | Albert Wolsky
1980s Oscar-winning costume designs
- Tess (1980) | Set in the 1870s | Anthony Powell
- Chariots of Fire (1981) | Set in the 1920s | Milena Canonero
- Gandhi (1982) | Set in the 1900s | Bhanu Athaiya & John Mollo
- Fanny and Alexander (1983) | Set in the 1900s | Marik Vos-Lundh
- Amadeus (1984) | Set in the 1700s | Theodor Pištěk
- Ran (1985) | Set in 1180 AD | Emi Wada
- A Room with a View (1986) | Set in the 1900s | Jenny Beavan & John Bright
- The Last Emperor (1987) | Set in the 1950s | James Acheson
- Dangerous Liaisons (1988) | Set in the 1700s | James Acheson
- Henry V (1989) | Set in the 1400s | Phyllis Dalton
1990s Oscar-winning costume designs
- Cyrano de Bergerac (1990) | Set in the 1600s | Franca Squarciapino
- Bugsy (1991) | Set in the 1940s | Albert Wolsky
- Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) | Set in the 1900s | Eiko Ishioka
- The Age of Innocence (1993) | Set in the 1870s | Gabriella Pescucci
- The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994) | Set in the 1990s | Tim Chappel & Lizzy Gardiner
- Restoration (1995) | Set in the 1660s | James Acheson
- The English Patient (1996) | Set in the 1940s | Ann Roth
- Titanic (1997) | Set in the 1910s | Deborah Lynn Scott
- Shakespeare in Love (1998) | Set in the 1590s | Sandy Powell
- Topsy-Turvy (1999) | Set in the 1880s | Lindy Hemming
Interesting Findings
- Designer Edith Head has won more Academy Awards for Best Costume Design than anyone else in Oscar history.
- Head took home 8 Oscar Academy awards between 1949 and 1973, gaining 9% of all costume design wins.
- For half those wins, Head was the sole designer on the award roster.
- Of all 90 films to win an Oscar Award for costume design, dramas have won the most at 38%, followed by biographies at 23%.
- Films set in the early 20th century frequently win Oscar Academy Awards—11% of winning films take place in the 1920s, while 10% take place in the 1950s.
- Of the winning films set in the 1920s, 70% were produced after the year 2000.
- Of the winning films set in the 1950s, two-thirds were produced during the 1950s. Since then, the Academy has shifted to awarding period or fantasy films more often than contemporary films.
- Ruth E. Carter, who designed costumes for the Oscar-winning Black Panther (2018), drew from an intercontinental mix of modern African designers, indigenous tribal wear, and European labels including Balmain, Burberry, and Alexander McQueen.
- Film costumes come to a variety of fates after production—including being recycled by the studio for later movies or TV shows.
- While The 7-Year Itch (1945) didn’t win the Academy Award for Best Costume Design, Marilyn Monroe’s ivory dress was the most expensive movie costume ever sold at $4.6M.
- Audrey Hepburn’s black-and-white getup in My Fair Lady (1964), which did win an Oscar Award for costume design, was a close second at $4.5M.
Methodology
To make a comprehensive study of Oscar-winning costume designs, we used IMDb to gather a list of all Academy Awards for Best Costume Design since the first in 1948. We also compiled the genre, setting, and costume designers for each winning film.
Note: The Academy awarded two Oscars for costume design most years until 1967 (one Oscar for black-and-white films, the other for color films). To simplify the graphics for this article, we displayed all pre-1970 Oscars in list form.
About
USDISH is an authorized reseller of DISH Network. For any media inquiries, contact media@usdish.com.
USDISH does not own the original costumes depicted in this article, nor is USDISH affiliated with any of the award organizations mentioned in this article. Subsequently, USDISH does not participate in giving the awards or predicting future wins from any organization.
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