Secondhand Chic

THE MOVIE: “Rambling Rose.”

THE SETUP: Depression-era tale of a sweet young nymphet, Rose (Laura Dern, pictured) who, orphaned and dirt-poor, is welcomed into the arms of an upright, middle-class Southern family including Mother (Diane Ladd), Daddy (Robert Duvall) and teen-age Buddy (Lukas Haas).

THE LOOK: Let’s call it the fashion equivalent of Shabby Chic and all the other L.A. furniture stores that sell tea-dyed, pre-faded floral slipcovers. Rose’s dull floral print dresses--bleached to perfection by costume designer Jane Robinson--not only perfectly evoke the period but also suit the secondhand Rose image. The trick was making Rose’s sheer cotton lawn dresses look “tired,” as if they were hand-me-downs, but not frumpy--they cling and plunge in just the right places. Her small wardrobe of hats--a straw beret and a Little Bo Peep-like creation--look equally forlorn but somehow jaunty. The scene-stealer is the dress Rose says she made herself for man-hunting: a dumpy-sexy chartreuse halter strategically affixed with ribbon-twisted flowers and so sheer you can see she isn’t wearing underwear.

The educated and enlightened Mother shares in the fashion interest. She dresses the part of a Bloomsbury intellectual in floral kimonos worn over bias-cut silk dresses, a long strand of pearls and a silk scarf side-knotted on her head.

THE SOURCES: For Rose, London-based Robinson reworked old dresses from antique clothing stores or created new ones from antique fabrics. She designed all of Mother’s ensembles except the kimonos, which are original period pieces from London shops. She rented Daddy’s classic three-piece suits from British costume houses.

Not to be ignored are accessories: the hats were purchased in antique stores, except Daddy’s Panama, which was unearthed at the Rose Bowl Flea Market. Wonderful old floral and rickrack-trimmed aprons worn by Mother and Rose came from England’s the Last Picture Frock costume house. And Robinson discovered Rose’s Mary Jane shoes in an antique clothing store on location in Wilmington, N.C..

THE PAYOFF: Original and vintage clothes blended in wardrobes that underscore each character’s inner story.