there was a day when William Travilla he thought, among others, about thewhite cocktail dress most famous in the history of cinema: he designed and created it for his very blonde muse who made it a legend by making it artfully flutter on the subway grate.
Among the great costume designers of the golden age of Hollywood, among giants like Adrian and Edith Head, probably William Travilla has been more underrated than his colleagues to date, but without a doubt, in terms of talent, he was second to none.
She preferred to dress men (but created fabulous women’s clothes) and is considered the forerunner of color harmony. Let’s give thanks to Edith Head, a teacher who accidentally became the greatest costume designer of all time (now celebrated with an exhibition), for giving us cinematic looks that are the stuff dreams are made of.
During his career, between the 40s and the 80s, has dressed around 270 stars including Loretta Young, Judy Garland, Jane Russel, Sharon Tate, Lana Turner, Clarke Gable, Paul Newman and Whitney Houston.
But his name is closely linked to that of Marilyn Monroe for whom he created the famous white dress When the wife is on vacation and other iconic models (even off the set), contributing considerably to the sensual image of the platinum diva.
“My clothes for Marilyn were an act of love. Since I adored her, I could only do my best for her,” he declared. Travilla also had a relationship with the actress for a short time, which ended after she met Joe DiMaggio. Precisely because of the diva’s marriage to the sportsman, the designer embellished the famous dark suit worn by Monroe with an ermine fur collar and diamond buttons, giving that outfit aallure glamorous.
William Travilla’s talent was, precisely, in the to be able to enhance the physicality and tastes of the super actress, making her always sensual and perfect in real life and for every role, so much so that several items of clothing designed for the cinema later found space in Marilyn’s wardrobe.
If shoulder pads exist in fashion, precursors of feminist revolutions, if women show off androgynous looks with cloche hats and if designers use cellophane for their creations, it is all thanks to him. Adrian, among Hollywood stylists, is perhaps the most important: with him, in fact, the figure of the costume designer was born
Like the mythological shocking pink dress created in two days by the designer for the film Men prefer blondes, worn in a white version and without a bow by the actress in 1954 for the premiere of the film Follies of the yearor the orange dress sported in the same film (which is said to have caused gasps among the audience in the theater), which Marilyn Monroe loved so much that she wanted a salmon version for her personal wardrobe.
Interestingly, the dress, most likely owned by the studios, appeared in another film titled The Girl Can’t Help It, worn by actress Abbey Lincoln who later returned to wear it again on the cover of the magazine Ebony of 1957.
And how can we not mention the piece that Travilla incredibly defined as “that silly little dress”, namely the silk cocktail dress When is the wife on vacation? After Marilyn’s death in 1962, it was rumored that the dress, along with several others, had been kept by the designer. Actress Debbie Reynolds purchased it for $200 after Travilla’s death in 1990 before selling it at auction in 2011 for $4.6 million.
Yet, despite helping make Norma Jean Marilyn Monroe, William Travilla’s only Oscar win during his career is tied to stage costumes of an actor, Errol Flynn. In fact, he drew for the star the costumes for The Adventures of Don Giovanni: Thanks to his formidable art, the costume designer managed to refresh the image of the actor, aged and weighed down by the use of drugs, so much so that he magically managed to make him sexy again by making him wear a pair of tights, then taken as a model for other historical adaptations.
Master of pleating, fabric cutting engineer, The costume designer’s timeless style set him apart from everyone else: in the 1960s he created his own clothing line, distancing himself from the studios. As a freelance designer he continued to create dreams in the form of dresses for the cinema and, later, for television, winning an Emmy in 1985 for Dallas. His, in fact, are the sparkling dresses sported by Linda Gray aka Sue Ellen in the legendary 80’s TV series, like the gorgeous one-shoulder black cocktail dress embellished with a new set of black and white feathers.
If Yves Saint Laurent designed an entire collection in honor of William Travilla’s designs for Marilyn and Thierry Mugler has often stated that the Hollywood costume designer was his greatest artistic influence, the legacy in fashion system of the man who whispered glamour and sensuality to the stars, is great. “Billy, dear, please dress me forever. I love you, Marilyn,” the diva wrote to him one day. What else can I add?
Source: Vanity Fair
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