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Monday, March 10, 2025
“Conclave's” Oscar-Nominated Costume Designer Lisy Christl on the Fashion of Faith
The Credits: Following his Oscar-winning WWI epic, All Quiet on the Western Front, Edward Berger’s latest, Conclave, focuses on a different kind of battle, dropping us into the Vatican in his twisty ecclesiastical thriller.
1 comment:
Ava Basso
said...
I have a lot to say about this article. I found the research process very interesting as well as the construction process. It’s amazing that they made every piece in this film from scratch, as there are so many of these pieces. I found it crazy how she made a comment that they had around 3500 yards of fabric. The thing that was the most interesting to me however, was the crosses and rings. Since this is such an interesting film to design in any regard, as it technically takes place in the modern day, but all of the settings and costumes are also technically historical since what they are based on was created hundreds and hundreds of years ago, I think that it was only right that they outsourced to local fabricators. The fact that each cross is reflective of the political views of each character is a great detail, and definitely something that would only be possible with the collaboration they did with the family run Goldsmith and Florence. I found that comment Christl made in fact kind of beautiful, “As a designer you don’t have years to prepare for a movie, and these goldsmiths have the knowledge of generations.” One criticism that I do have about this film though is the change in colour that Christl employed. While I do think that the deeper red is gorgeously stunning and effective in the cassocks, mozzettas, and ferraiolos, I think it looks terrible on the chasubles. As the aforementioned pieces stray only slightly from the original red, the red on the film’s chasubles is so deep it looks almost purple. Some may think differently about this choice, but to me it is too far removed (especially since purple has an entirely different meaning in the Catholic Church) and undermines the integrity of the piece. Just something interesting to think about, where do we draw the line with historical garment recreations?
1 comment:
I have a lot to say about this article. I found the research process very interesting as well as the construction process. It’s amazing that they made every piece in this film from scratch, as there are so many of these pieces. I found it crazy how she made a comment that they had around 3500 yards of fabric. The thing that was the most interesting to me however, was the crosses and rings. Since this is such an interesting film to design in any regard, as it technically takes place in the modern day, but all of the settings and costumes are also technically historical since what they are based on was created hundreds and hundreds of years ago, I think that it was only right that they outsourced to local fabricators. The fact that each cross is reflective of the political views of each character is a great detail, and definitely something that would only be possible with the collaboration they did with the family run Goldsmith and Florence. I found that comment Christl made in fact kind of beautiful, “As a designer you don’t have years to prepare for a movie, and these goldsmiths have the knowledge of generations.” One criticism that I do have about this film though is the change in colour that Christl employed. While I do think that the deeper red is gorgeously stunning and effective in the cassocks, mozzettas, and ferraiolos, I think it looks terrible on the chasubles. As the aforementioned pieces stray only slightly from the original red, the red on the film’s chasubles is so deep it looks almost purple. Some may think differently about this choice, but to me it is too far removed (especially since purple has an entirely different meaning in the Catholic Church) and undermines the integrity of the piece. Just something interesting to think about, where do we draw the line with historical garment recreations?
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