Quote

In the '50s, women aspired to dress like their mothers - this polished, controlled, formal way of dressing. Then all of a sudden in the '60s, going into the '70s, they stopped dressing like their mothers.

Baby fashion has become such a big thing. It used to be that everything had to be pink or blue or cute - you know, very precious - but not cool. But now, my friends who are mothers really want to dress their kids just like themselves.

My mother used to dress rather risque when I was a kid, and that sort of shocked me. I always thought moms were supposed to wear cardigans and flats, but she was in leather bracelets and minidresses. In hindsight, it was pretty cool, but I'm probably more conservative because of it.

I think of 'Mommy' as very simplistic or not simplistic, but I wish for the style to actually work with what you see onscreen and what you feel in that very moment. I hope we did not disrespect the characters by being too flamboyant when it's not necessary.

Fashion is a dangerous road to go down. Anybody who is going to have children later in life had best not be too fashionable because the photos will come back to haunt them.

My mum is totally crazy for fashion still. Her job was as a laundress, but I loved it when she would dress up in her red suit with a mini jacket and flared trousers and get her wig fixed at the hairdresser's - it was the time of wigs - and we would go shopping.

Costumes say a lot about a character. When it came to 'Palo Alto,' it was important for me that the kids didn't look perfect. In most teen movies today, all of the clothes are expensive. I remember wearing a lot of dirty vintage clothes.

Fashion was in a crisis up until the mid-'90s and, when it came out of the crisis, it was a very different place. It was a place that nurtured and cultivated young entrepreneurial designers.

It took me a while to warm to the '20s costumes on 'Downton.' I love it when women accentuate their curves, and that era was all about hiding them. The shapes they wore then were in tune with female empowerment. Cutting off their hair and hiding their busts was a way of saying, 'We're equal to men!'

My fancy dress costume of choice is... something 1920s or 30s, when there was still so much elegance and attention to detail. An excuse for ultimate dressing-up indulgence.