Adrian, King of Golden Age Glamour
Close your eyes and picture yourself as a 1930s Hollywood starlet. Your hair is perfectly coiffed, and you are dripping in jewels. Now, let your eyelids flutter open and drift down your body. Who are you wearing? Chances are it’s Adrian! As in Gilbert Adrian, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's head designer for thirteen years who created costumes for over 200 films. Out of all the films he worked on, many became the most influential productions of the era. During his career, Adrian dressed Greta Garbo, Jean Harlow, Norma Shearer, Katharine Hepburn, and Joan Crawford. In fact, his signature designs for Crawford, an actress with stunningly broad shoulders, inspired women everywhere to don shoulder pads in the 1940s, according to the New England Historical Society.
Pictured above: Gilbert Adrian (also known as Adrian Greenberg, or most commonly Adrian)
Pictured below: Joan Crawford in Adrian’s designs
First lured to Hollywood by Rudolph Valentino, Adrian soon became the favorite designer of director Cecil B DeMille. When DeMille joined MGM in 1928, he took Adrian along with him. There, Adrian met and worked with actress Greta Garbo. Adrian designed some of the most original, striking, and iconic looks of his career when working for Garbo, styling her different characters such as Mata Hari, Queen Christina, and Camille - all exquisitely crafted, but never overpowering Garbo’s talents. He knew how to bring a film’s character and an actor’s personality into a perfect marriage.
pictured above: Greta Garbo as Mata Hari, designed by Adrian
pictured above: Garbo as Queen Christina, designed by Adrian
My first introduction to his work was when I watched The Women. I first saw the film in my History of Fashion class. Before then I had seen a few black and white movies but was only just discovering a love for costume design. The way The Women portrays each character’s unique style and the stunning evening wear in the film is awe-inspiring. If you prefer real life drama, research about the feud between Norma Shearer and Joan Crawford, and imagine being in the position of dressing both of them in the same film!
The rest of the world may best remember Adrian’s work on a little film called The Wizard of Oz. He was the creative genius behind the ruby slippers – originally silver in the book. Unlike many previous design heads, Adrian insisted on designing all of the costumes in each film himself. He would draw hundreds of sketches for each production, and his team would execute directly from his designs. Glinda’s frilly confection, the Tin Man’s armor, and Dorothy’s gingham dress all came from Adrian’s vivid imagination.
In 1941, Adrian and Garbo both left MGM and Adrian started his own retail shop in Beverly Hills the following year. His clean, timeless style and signature glamour influenced American fashion throughout the 40s and beyond. Studios opened shops inside stores like Macys to sell copies of film costume creations directly to the public. Other designers had found ways to emphasize the shoulders, but Adrian’s styling of shoulderpads looked more natural and was more comfortable than anything that had come before.
pictured above: Adrian and Joan Crawford
Women’s power suits of the 1980s echo the silhouettes he designed for Joan Crawford as well. As styles of the 80s and 90s come back in fashion, we will continue seeing the return of big shoulders. Perhaps, for that, we should thank Adrian.