Fashion on the Red Carpet: A History of the Oscars®, Fashion and Globalisation

by Elizabeth Castaldo Lundén

Overview

The Academy Awards’ red-carpet is the most prominent fashion show in media culture. Fashion on the Red Carpet investigates the historical liaison between Hollywood and fashion institutions, to describe how public relations campaigns and the media articulate fashion discourses around the Oscars. The power-shift towards television, the emergence of celebrity culture, the post-war reactivation of transatlantic trade, the growth of fashion journalism, and the increasing circulation of designer names in the media, are converging factors leading to the institutionalisation of the red-carpet as a fashion event in its own right.
Departing from archival sources, and tracing discourses of fashion, stardom, and celebrity surrounding Hollywood and the Oscars, this fascinating book explains how the red-carpet became a marquee for the endorsement of high-end fashion brands.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781474461801
Publisher:	Edinburgh University Press
Publication date:	06/30/2021
Series:	Film and Fashions
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	6.69(w) x 9.61(h) x 0.63(d)

About the Author

Elizabeth Castaldo Lundén is a Fulbright Scholar and Sweden America Foundation Research Fellow at the School of Cinematic Arts of the University of Southern California

Table of Contents

List of FiguresPreface

Introduction – Fashion and Film: A Synergetic Kaleidoscope

1. ‘When You Wish Upon a Star…’.

2. The Hollywood Designers’ Reign

3. From Private Gatherings to Public Spectacle

4. Tracing the Academy Awards Ceremony’s Footprint into the Mediascape

5. Creating an International Fashion Show for the American Market

6. Style Arbiters and the Genesis of Best- and Worst-Dressed Lists

7. The Emergence of Fashion Conglomerates Turns Couture into Prêt-à-Porter

8. The Fashion Revolution

9. Twilight of the Idols

SourcesArchivesBibliography

Editorial Reviews

This important study advances our understanding of the historical, cultural, economic, and performative functions of fashion in modern life and everyday consciousness. Elizabeth Castaldo Lundén reveals how the red-carpeting of global culture still is expanding through established and newly innovated transmedia platforms. The study is a history of the Academy Awards observed through the lenses of fashion, celebrity, and media. Additionally, it refocuses on unexpected areas, such as the surprisingly crucial function of the anonymous fans who populate the bleachers aside the red carpet. The exemplary, meticulous, research utilizes original documents available only in the Academy’s archives. The depth and breadth of this scholarship are unparalleled.

Donald Crafton

This book offers a framework for understanding fashion at the Oscars and precise details that establish fashion as one part of a complex system. It can be enjoyed cover–to–cover, but is equally important as a reference tool for anyone conducting interdisciplinary research in the fields of fashion, film and media studies, or advertising.

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