Jean Harlow

What 1930 Looked Like in the Movies

What 1930 Looked Like in the Movies

1930 bridged the gap between the decadent 1920s and the introduction and enforcement of the Hayes Motion Picture Code which cracked down on immorality, nudity and general fun at the movies*. Here are some of the films released in this year. They range from the sublime to the ridiculous and from racy to glamorous not(…)

Screen Idols: Clark Gable, The King of Hollywood

Screen Idols: Clark Gable, The King of Hollywood

Gable started out in Hollywood playing bit-parts in silent movies in the mid 1920s and starred in his first starring role in 1931 in The Painted Desert opposite leading lady Helen Twelvetrees. The movie that really catapulted him to fame was Red Dust (which I reviewed last week)  where his rough and ready sex appeal(…)

Movie Tuesday: Red Dust (1932)

Movie Tuesday: Red Dust (1932)

I’ve never really ‘got’ the Clark Gable thing. I’ve watched Gone With The Wind without him leaving any particular impression on me but after watching Red Dust I get it. Maybe there’s something about a rough-and-ready Gable and the sultry heat of the jungle, both women in this movie certainly seem to think so! It’s(…)

9 Classic Hollywood Stars Who Didn’t Make it to 40 (and What Happened to Them)

9 Classic Hollywood Stars Who Didn’t Make it to 40 (and What Happened to Them)

I turn 40 next week and this milestone got me thinking about all the Hollywood stars who died tragically young and didn’t even make it this far. Their deaths ranged from suicide, to murder, car and plane crashes and even an allergic reaction to a headache tablet. Did I miss anyone out of this list(…)

Vintage Style Icons: The Ice-Cold Blonde

Vintage Style Icons: The Ice-Cold Blonde

Hitchcock’s fair-haired heroines are perhaps those that spring to mind when you think of an ice-cold blonde. They was certainly the type of woman Hitch fixated on: beautiful women who were cold and distant on the exterior but full of passion underneath. However the ice-cold blonde has been around for a lot longer than that,(…)

1930s Beauty: Jean Harlow and the Rise of the Peroxide Blonde

1930s Beauty: Jean Harlow and the Rise of the Peroxide Blonde

Jean Harlow, the original blonde bombshell, started the trend for bleaching hair in the 1930s. Before this it was very much just prostitutes woman of ill-repute who coloured their hair, it certainly wasn’t something done by ‘nice girls’ When Harlow exploded onto the silver screen in the early 1930s her white blonde hair caused a(…)

Top 25 Greatest Female Screen Legends

Top 25 Greatest Female Screen Legends

Some time ago the AFI (that’s the American Film Institute) released a list of the top 50 greatest screen legends from the Classic Hollywood era: 25 male and 25 female stars. I’m not sure exactly what their criteria were for reaching the top spot, but they classified a screen legend as an actor or actress:(…)

What’s in a name?

What’s in a name?

Quite a lot if we believe the Hollywood Studios of the 30s and 40s!  There were only a handful of Classic Hollywood stars who kept their own names, including Jane Russell, Ava Gardner, Elizabeth Taylor, Katharine Hepburn and Grace Kelly. The majority of actors and actresses had their identities completely re-written. How many of these 20(…)

The height of Hollywood actresses: a star-studded lineup

The height of Hollywood actresses: a star-studded lineup

The height of Hollywood stars is something which has always fascinated me. I’m not sure why, but actresses always seem taller than they actually are (perhaps because they’re projected onto an enormous screen!). I had no idea that I was the same height as Marilyn Monroe, or that Veronica Lake was a diminutive 4’11”. Veronica(…)

Vintage look book: Jean Harlow in bias-cut satin

This is my look book inspired by the Jean Harlow outfit I designed yesterday – I’m not good enough at sketching to get the textures through in the design, so you can see the fabrics I would have used here. One thing I will say is that I was shocked to see the amount of(…)

Fashion sketch: 1930s dress design for Jean Harlow

Fashion sketch: 1930s dress design for Jean Harlow

I haven’t posted a design for a while (so much for my New Year’s resolution eh?), but this is one I did a few weeks ago with Jean Harlow in mind – the dress would be made from a gorgeous ivory satin with draping around the neck and a (faux) fur stole with tan Mary(…)