Eiko Ishioka, celebrated costume designer for film and theatre, passed away two weeks ago at the age of 73. Her success as a costume designer came toward the end of a long career including stints in graphic design and advertising. Ishioka won an Oscar for her costumes in Bram Stoker’s Dracula and became a frequent collaborator with film director Tarsem, designing for all four of his films: The Cell, The Fall, Immortals, and the upcoming Mirror Mirror.

Her surreal and elaborate designs added immeasurably to the look of the films she worked on, often taking place in fantasy worlds or the subconscious. She could create the stuff of nightmares or provide the perfect outfit for a daydream.

Her Oscar-winning work for Bram Stoker’s Dracula was also the only time she was nominated. Who can forget Gary Oldman’s double-bun?



Her clothes for The Cell appeared deliberately uncomfortable and drew influence from torture devices and fetish wear—fitting for a film that takes place almost entirely inside the mind of a serial killer.

In her next film with Tarsem, The Fall, Ishioka mixed international styles to vividly illustrate a child’s imagination.

A scene from Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters

Ishioka excelled in creating fantastical designs, this time outfitting Greek gods for Tarsem’s Immortals.

Goodbye Eiko Ishioka. The world will be a little less surreal without you.

text by Daniel Reis

I’ve recently become addicted to the filmography of Alfred Hitchcock. Whenever something by the Master of Suspense is playing, you can’t not keep your eyes on the screen. Not only are they nail-bitingly intense, but you gotta love those classic and clean Edith Head costumes. These images are a few of my favourites from two of his most iconic films. How brilliant was it the way clothing was linked to mistaken identity in Vertigo?

North by Northwest is another great one. The menswear tailoring was very sharp, but my favourite scene to capture was with the shot of Bergdorf Goodman purse, showing a little gun tucked in the side. Nobody did classy badass better than Alfred Hitchcock and Edith Head.

text by Peghah Maleknejad

From the mid-1990s to early 2000s, there was a sort of moral panic associated with “hackers” and this crazy newfangled thing called the Internet. Movies like Hackers and The Matrix treated their characters like lawless individuals in a new Wild West—no rules, no moral compasses, just a bunch of hooligans speaking a lot of gibberish. And how did they use clothing to let people know they were scary? LEATHER. All leather, all the time. Pale skin from all that time indoors, facial piercings because they weren’t concerned with getting a good job, smudged eyeliner because they just didn’t give a fuck. Paired with some ridiculous sunglasses, outlandish hair, and huge jeans, they were dressed like every parent’s worst nightmare. Of course they all looked amazing.

Today, the stereotypical image of a person who works with computers is more likely to be a young female blogger or a clean shaven man in his mid-30s. But the American version of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, released today, is set in 2002, and Lisbeth Salander is still intended to look as scary as possible. I’m personally finding her look unbelievably cool. Of course her tattoos are amazing, but I’m equally inspired by her bleached eyebrows, severely cut hair, and clothes that aren’t so much “disheveled” as “so torn up that they are actually hanging on by a thread.” I want to look just like her, but I’d probably cross the street if I saw her coming.

The difference today is that I think Lisbeth is supposed to look aspirational—H&M is even selling a line of clothes based on her costumes from the film. In retrospect, I think all the women look pretty amazing: Angelina’s motorcycle jacket from Hackers, Trinity in her head-to-toe skintight leather, even Ms. Calendar (R.I.P.) in her leather jacket. Maybe when we all get sick of the 1990s grunge look we can move on to 90s hackers?

I can’t defend what’s going on with Julia Stiles though. That console cowboy is whack.

text by Haley Mlotek
video by Daniel Reis

Fashionably Late is a new feature on the WORN blog designed for current events in fashion that we are maybe a tad bit late on. You could say there was a party (on the Internet) and we showed up after everyone had gone home (or turned their laptops off). We know that some of these items have already been blogged and tweeted and tumbled to death but what can we say—we love them too! We’re busy, okay? We don’t have time to sit on the Internet all day! We don’t have to answer to you! Get out of our room! Ahem. With that in mind, WORN presents Fashionably Late.

It’s rare to come across a music video that is really, truly, terrifying, but that’s exactly what St. Vincent has done. Directed by Terri Timely, “Cruel” is my new favorite because it is both the creepiest and most fashionable music video I have ever watched. In brief: an eccentric family kidnaps a pretty hipster in a convenience store.

They take her to their suburban home and force her to assume the role of their wife and mother. For me, the real horror is when they show her the closet filled with abandoned dresses—she chooses between two dresses, seemingly resigned to her new life, and comes down the stairs to dance with her new husband.

What disturbs me most is the implication that you could somehow change your identity when you change your outfit. One day, you’re a young girl in skinny jeans grabbing some PBR before a friend’s pre-drink. The next day you’ve got a dress with a full skirt and an apron, and suddenly you’re a surrogate mother to some deranged version of the Cleaver family.

Of course, no amount of cute heels or pearls or dresses can convince this family to accept their new mom, so they bury her alive.

OH, GOOD. IT’S NOT LIKE I EVER WANTED TO SLEEP AGAIN ANYWAYS.

Certain television shows would have us believe that this style of dress is a return to classic femininity, to decorum, to taste, to a time when everyone wore their pantyhose perfectly and set their hair in rollers and families were happy—and if they weren’t, at least they looked really good while suffering through their suburban ennui. I prefer how “Cruel” re-imagines this re-imagining as a horror movie, not a fantasy.

text by Haley Mlotek