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| Creating a Super-famous Mennonite Costumes : fancy dress for women |
When Women Speak, Sarah Polley is by no means a “fashion film,” a film about women’s reactions to a series of rapes within a Mennonite community. While the dresses are far from mainstream, the long, dark floral dresses worn by actors like Claire Foy, Jessie Buckley and Frances McDormand – who were nominated for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture at this weekend’s Screen Actors Guild Awards – shine to match the fashion.
Traditional Mennonite communities often live outside of the mainstream community. Kuita Alfred, the film’s costume designer, believes we’re drawn to these communities because of “a false nostalgia.” He adds, “There’s definitely a verdict. It’s, ‘Oh, we can do whatever we want. Aren’t we modern? Aren’t we intellectual?’ I certainly don’t back down from that judgment. I think the bright side of nostalgia can be a nostalgia for a simpler time.”
.Both women noticed this connection when they first started working on the film and how the aesthetic momentarily becomes fashionable thanks to a gentle vision of pastoral life through vintage Laura Ashley dresses and “tablescaping” blossomed into epidemics.
“When we started, Sarah and I communicated via email and I sent her pictures from Vogue and Elle: ‘Did we start this?’
Alfred points out that this isn’t the first time vintage floral and floral designs have been in vogue. “When I was a kid in the mid-1970s, Holy Hobby, the Little House on the Prairie thing, was huge,” he says. She recalls wearing a floral sundress with her mother on vacation in the mid-’70s. “We were waiting for a coach and one said, ‘I don’t know, maybe they’re Mennonite or something?’ Because we wore our matching calico dresses.”
Alfred says the costumes in the film are “100% accurate”. We do not need to buy a theatrical license for this film. But it was out of respect … [during the research] I was taken into a non-Mennonite world that was inaccessible to me.”
Alfred hails from Manitoba, Canada, a long-standing Mennonite community. “Growing up, my neighbors, my friends, my classmates, my classmates, my babysitters were all Mennonite,” she says. “I had a very rudimentary knowledge of culture.” Mennonites are now in his church.
Creating a Super-famous Mennonite Costumes : fancy dress for women
Through family connections, Alfred found two mentors who reliably helped him create the costumes. They helped her purchase fabrics from shops used by Mennonite women and made sure their designs followed the culture’s traditions. She bought original clothing from thrift stores to wear extras and copy patterns.
Mennonite women use the concept of “empty clothing,” Alfred says, suggesting that one’s clothing expresses a profession of faith. That’s why dresses don’t have pockets. “I’ve been told there’s no place for lazy hands,” he says.
To avoid any arrogance, they conform to a hidden aesthetic. “No jewelry, no embellishment … young women in the community choose their clothes accordingly,” he said. Small details can be disputed. “The churches disagree on whether women can button up or not, they are too proud and too elegant,” says Alfred.
For this film, the cast wore darker fabrics than typical Mennonite attire, which tends to use bright florals. It was tied to the plot. “For Scarface (McDormand’s character who refuses to leave society), he had to be really, really traditional in dark colors. Because of his stance on the subject, they reminded me of dried blood and rust and immobility.” Meanwhile, Buckley’s Mariche, who has an abusive husband, “is just clinging to life, mentally and physically. “
When it comes to women speaking, Alfred cares less about how the clothing might enhance the cottagecore look and more about how it reaches women like the people in the film. “Modestly dressed, very conservative women will watch the film. They rarely come to town,” he says. “Things like that are great are also effective. Not that we, as secular misfits, shouldn’t pat ourselves on the back that we’ve changed something. But it’s very moving and surprising to see the discussions taking place,” he said.