Costume Designers Guild

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The Costume Designers Guild (CDG), IATSE LOCAL 892 was founded in 1953 by a group of 30 motion picture costume designers. In 1986, the CDG joined the International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employees and added Local 892 to its name. Today, its international membership includes motion picture, television, and commercial costume designers, assistant costume designers and costume illustrators, and totals some 900 members. The jurisiction of Local 892 is centered in and around Los Angeles. The Costume Designers Guild, Local 892, publishes a quarterly magazine The Costume Designer, founded in 2005, and a CDG Newsletter six times a year.

A costume designer is a director's Key Collaborator. Costume is an important tool the Director has to tell the story. Costume designers work intimately with actors and many actors find their characters in the dressing room. From the moment, a character appears on the screen, before a word of dialogue is spoken, the audience knows who they are. Great costuming is subtle - the audience is not supposed to notice the costumes but be affected by them. Modern costume, period costume and fantasy costume is created using the same creative path and process and designers acknowledge that each has its own challenges.

Characters are integral to every movie and television production - and costume designers bring them to life. The creative collaborators: the cinematographers (the light), the production designers (the place) and the costume designers (the people) work together to paint each frame of film, designing the invented universe of the script, as interpreted by the director.

Costume Design serves two equal purposes: to support the story by creating truthful characters, and to provide balance within the frame of the film by providing color, texture and silhouette. Costumes and characters are always the "foreground action" because movies are about people. Costume designers are people experts, the artist anthropologists of the movies.

[edit] CDG Awards

Founded in 1999, the CDG Awards honors Costume Designers in Motion Pictures, Television, and Commercials. The "Gilda" statuette was manufactured in sterling silver by renowned Italian jeweler Bvlgari and was created by costume designer, and CDG member, David Le Vey. Sponsors of this glamorous Los Angeles evening have included Ferragamo and most recently Swarovski. Each year distinguished actors, directors and producers are honored, and a single costume career award is given for motion pictures and television.