I can’t remember the last time a film’s costumes generated as much buzz or discourse as the extraordinary creations crafted by two-time Oscar winner Jacqueline Durran for Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights. Well, the last time was probably Greta Gerwig’s Barbie—Durran was responsible for that cultural phenomenon’s brilliant wardrobe, too; as she was for Kristen Stewart’s Chanel finery in Spencer, the March sisters’ ballgowns in Little Women, and Keira Knightley’s unforgettable looks in Anna Karenina, Pride & Prejudice, and Atonement. (The latter’s green dress remains one of the most talked-about onscreen looks of all time.)
No wonder, then, that Fennell and Margot Robbie—our new Cathy, who is also a producer on the forthcoming romance and previously collaborated with Durran on Barbie—recruited the supremely talented Brit for their sweeping new epic, though they couldn’t possibly have guessed the column inches her work would generate long before the film even hit screens. From the moment the first grainy paparazzi shots surfaced from the set, the internet was ablaze with hot takes on the costumes’ period inaccuracies and general outlandishness.
Fennell, Robbie, and Durran remain unfazed. Wuthering Heights was always envisioned as a kind of fantastical fever dream—a contemporary take on a ’50s soundstage melodrama that gleefully mixes historical references with glitzy modernity. As the film’s first trailers show, this Cathy would not be a pared-back brunette drifting through the moors in muted, high-waisted frocks—she would instead be an exuberant blonde living it up in German milkmaid-esque corsets, high-shine showstoppers, and Elton John sunglasses. And her co-stars—Jacob Elordi as a brooding Heathcliff, Alison Oliver as an angelic Isabella Linton, Hong Chau as a steely Nelly Dean, and Shazad Latif as a swaggering Edgar Linton—would also be subverting our expectations.
Ahead of the film’s release on February 13, on the cusp of Valentine’s Day, Durran gives Vogue an exclusive closer look at her incredible work and some of the images on her mood board, and talks us through the most important looks. From Cathy’s translucent wedding-night ensemble to a giant furry Russian hat, and the “latex dress” that’s got everyone talking (correction: it’s not actually latex), there’s much to unpack.
Vogue: Firstly, how many costumes does Margot’s Cathy have in Wuthering Heights?
Jacqueline Durran: With overlaps and reuse, we created between 45 and 50 costumes just for Cathy.
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