Few artists have dominated a single aspect of the film industry like Edith Head did during the Golden Age of Hollywood. Head was a legendary costume designer who created outfits for stars like Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor and Grace Kelly and worked with directors like Alfred Hitchcock, William Wyler and Billy Wilder. She would have turned 115 today and Google honored her birthday with a Google Doodle.
The doodle features Head in front, with several designs behind her, drawn in the style of her designs. She was born in 1897 in San Bernardino, California and died in 1981 in Los Angeles.
As EW notes, she joined Paramount Pictures as a costume sketch artist in 1924. During her career, which stretched into the late 1970s, she was nominated for 35 Oscars and won eight. Her wins came for The Heiress, Samson and Delilah, All About Eve, A Place In The Sun, Roman Holiday, Sabrina, The Facts of Life and The Sting.
Despite all those Oscars, Head is best known for creating the costumes that Hitchcock’s actresses wore. She worked with the Master of Suspense on his best films, including Vertigo, Rear Window and The Birds.
Here’s an interview with Head, in which she talks about dressing Hepburn for , the film that introduced Hepburn to American audiences and won her the Oscar for Best Actress.
image: Google