Casson Mann works on V&A’s Hollywood Costume show

The consultancy is creating an exhibition of more than 100 costumes, from over a century of filmmaking, for the exhibition which opens in October.

The exhibition is being curated by Professor Deborah Nadoolman Landis, costume designer for Raiders of the Lost Ark and Kill Bill, costume designer Keith Lodwick and former Royal College of Art rector Sir Christopher Frayling.

It will explore the role of costume design as an essential tool of cinema,the creative process from script to screen and the social and technological context of costume design for film.

The costumes, including Dorothy’s dress from the Wizard of Oz and a Marilyn Monroe number from Some Like it Hot, will be supported by sketches, script pages, archive footage and specially commissioned interviews with designers, directors and film stars like Meryl Streep.

Frayling describes Casson Mann’s work as ‘completely integral’ to the exhibition’s potential success, involving the consultancy with production a year earlier than with most exhibitions held by the V&A.

He says, ‘This exhibition is all about the visual impact, design was very important.We chose Casson Mann because the consultancy completely got it, realising we mustn’t overdesign and try and compete with cinema, but that we must show off the costumes.

‘It’s difficult doing performing arts exhibitions like this one, people feel shortchanged if it’s not like the movie. Casson Mann has created a live feeling with different levels and having things fly in, rather than just using the floor.’