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The designer Holly Waddington had wide latitude in envisioning the costumes for \u201cPoor Things,\u201d Yorgos Lanthimos\u2019s mad comedy starring Emma Stone<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThe only brief really was that he didn\u2019t want it to be overtly like a period drama\u201d \u2014 the script is set in the 1880s \u2014 \u201cand he didn\u2019t want it to be overtly like a science fiction film,\u201d Waddington said. In the movie (a Golden Lion<\/a> winner at the Venice Film Festival and now an Oscar contender), Stone is a scientist\u2019s creation who evolves from a childlike na\u00eff to a sexually and politically liberated woman.<\/p>\n The Greek-born director Lanthimos, known for his surrealist vision, gave Waddington only one reference image: a young designer\u2019s take on \u201cinflatable trousers,\u201d Waddington recalled. When puffed up, they \u201ccreated this really exaggerated shape, just incredibly curvaceous.\u201d She worked with other departments, like production design and hair and makeup, to finish the look for Stone\u2019s Bella Baxter, whose life changes on a Grand Tour of cities like Lisbon.<\/p>\n A lot snapped into focus when Waddington learned that Bella would have long, jet-black hair; an Egon Schiele painting<\/a> was Lanthimos\u2019s inspiration for that, she said, and it informed her color palette. Another thing to consider, in a movie with a lot of sex scenes: How the clothes come off. \u201cI had many slightly awkward conversations with Yorgos about it,\u201d she said. \u201cHe was asking me, how does she have sex in these? I was probably a bit embarrassed. But he\u2019s not, at all.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Waddington knew her Victoriana; she spent years working in a costume house, specializing in archival ladies fashion. But for this film, she cut loose the corsetry \u2014 a scary prospect at first, she said, because corsets give period clothes their shape \u2014 and mixed eras and materials. Early on, Mrs. Prim, the medical assistant turned nanny, chooses Bella\u2019s wardrobe; then she finds her own style. \u201cThe clothes needed to really change with her,\u201d Waddington said.<\/p>\n Beyond that, Lanthimos offered conceptual freedom. \u201cHe just doesn\u2019t need to have a whole back story,\u201d she said. If it looked good, it flew. Bella\u2019s statement sleeves are already having a moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n In a video interview from her London home, Waddington discussed how, and why, she dressed Stone in three key moments of the movie. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.<\/p>\n That look in the house is all based around the idea of her being a very young child at this point. And she\u2019s being dressed by Mrs. Prim, who finds her really annoying. The clothes are not baby clothes, they\u2019re womanly, but applied in this slightly ad hoc fashion, because she has the physicality of a child. Very quickly, things have dissembled and come off. And this is just based on my own observations of children that, even if you\u2019re going to a smart occasion, the clothes, especially from the waist down, often come off. It\u2019s just a slightly discordant, uncomfortable way to dress a woman \u2014 like an anxiety dream about going to a job interview wearing a suit at the top and nothing on the bottom, just knickers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The knickers are almost like 1950s nappy covers and they\u2019re highly textured \u2014 seersucker. And then there\u2019s this big bodice, a very thick moir\u00e9 taffeta. The thickness of the cloth is almost too thick for human scale, which is what you get when you look at dolls. Often their fabrics look like marzipan \u2014 like cake decoration. Also, the striations in the moir\u00e9 look to me like the organic marks that you get in flesh.<\/p>\n She wears this funny little bustle \u2014 one of my favorite things in the film. It\u2019s based on an authentic late Victorian bustle cage which would have been worn underneath the dress to give it volume. What struck me is that it looked super sci-fi.<\/p>\n During the pandemic, the producers arranged for me to go and meet Emma. I took many different renditions of sleeves with me \u2014 big sleeves, medium sized. I took lots of different kinds of knickers. I had an idea about how I wanted it to progress, but it was really in that fitting, trying all these shapes on Emma, that I was able to say, OK, we definitely need a bustle, we need these special 1930s tap pants, which I had just thrown in the suitcase at the last minute. They were a departure from the babyish knickers. In Lisbon, they\u2019re silky and fluid \u2014 they\u2019ve grown up and they\u2019re sexy.<\/p>\n1. Bella at Home<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
2. Lisbon Outfit<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n