Last month there was all of this kerfuffle going on about the new Simplicity pattern released, designed by American Duchess, and inspiration taken from “The Red Dress” seen in Outlander, Season 2 designed by Terry Dresbach.
I thought I’d share my rambling ideas on this [apparently] controversial sewing pattern.
Simplicity Pattern Company asked Lauren Stowell, owner of American Duchess, to design a costume sewing pattern for the particular dress.
We must remember that in 2016 Lauren had designed two other patterns in the Outlander vein for 18th century costuming (Simplicity 8162 Undergarments and Stays and Simplicity 8161 Dress, Bodice and Petticoat).
And then they asked her to make another pattern based on The Red Dress.
My question is: Why all the hoopla now? Why this dress? Is it because it’s red?
Or is it simply because the fabulous costumes are drawing people into sewing because of the popularity of the Outlander series going on right now?
Quite honestly, I don’t understand why the costume designer flipped out about this sewing pattern… one that was merely inspired by but not taken directly from her original dress on the show.
I’m curious: Why didn’t she flip out about the show-inspired undergarment pattern? Or the day dress pattern?
The day dress pattern is clearly taken from inspiration from the Outlander series. Inspired by. These sewing patterns are not designed as exact replicas of TV show designs. (You’d need the original pattern the show costume was made from in that case.)
Instead, Lauren has based them more on 18th century garment cut and styling but with the flavor of Outlander thrown in.
Everyone who has seen Outlander can look at the patterns and conclude they were inspired by the show costumes. Lauren has been very open with her inspiration especially on this red dress. But she has also shown original 18th century examples (in the above blog posts) of where she took her inspiration from to make it more realistic, based more on historical garments.
But again – Why such a big blow up over this particular pattern from Simplicity?
When we look back 20 years ago with the blockbuster Titanic, Simplicity released costume patterns where you could *clearly* see they were inspired directly from the designs Deborah Scott had created for the movie.
Historically, releasing sewing patterns (and fashion items for that matter) based on popular films is a common thing.
Jump forward a few years from 1997 and we’ve got Star Wars and The Matrix as inspirations. We see Lord of the Rings inspired patterns produced with lots of capes and kirtle gowns.
I didn’t catch wind of the costume designers of those films blowing a fit that their designs were showing up as sewing patterns. (At least not so publicly.)
Fashion, because it’s clothing, is not copyrightable. Apparently, there is some momentum, at least in the USA, in trying to get the actual designs from TV shows and movies to get copyrighted. Or at least get their name printed on advertising and labels of these inspired fashions.
Yet, that’s not going to stop this multi-billion dollar wheel of fashion from spinning. I’m sorry, no. No, it’s not going to happen.
[Read more in this conversation on Terry Dresbach’s Twitter.]
Because you’re going to see companies in China (among other places) viewing a TV show and doing their own sketches, producing their own patterns, and then creating their own costume pieces to sell.
Anyone search Etsy lately?? Yeah….
There’s nothing stopping folks from looking at a design and re-creating it.
All of us who do historical costuming – that’s what we’re doing!
We’re basing our designs on what we see historically… in antique garments that are available and we’re reproducing them… putting our own little spin on them. Using fashion plates for inspiration. Photographs we try to copy.
Like the recent “Dress Like Your Grandma” challenge where people used a vintage photo – something from the 20th century – to re-create it. A garment your grandmother or great-grandmother wore and you’re copying what you see in the photograph.
I just don’t understand why THIS latest Simplicity sewing pattern has caused SO much conflict and bitterness from the costume designer. So much so that she had a rant on Twitter and threatened to take her blog down (which is still down as of today).
It projects very unprofessional behavior.
I would think, if you have a design or are designing for a show and another designer gets with one of the big commercial pattern publishers like Simplicity or McCalls/Butterick and they produce a sewing pattern inspired by your work then you have all of these new people who want to dress like their favorite character from *your* popular TV show or favorite movie.
They get an opportunity to dress up as that character. They get a sewing pattern that allows them to do that.
It inspires that person to be creative, but it also inspires their friends who see what they’re doing to want to get creative too. It makes this whole industry go around!
It gets new people saying: “Oh wow. That’s a great costume! What’s that from? Where did you get it? What’s your inspiration?”
“Oh, I’m watching [in this case] Outlander.”
More people start watching the show which means more money for the producers and for advertising and everything that goes along with that.
The producers see that there’s this growing popularity so they say: “Hey! Let’s do another season.” And they hire everybody back – the crew, the production people, and the costume designer. Gee! Their jobs are continuing at that point.
This gets more people being creative and inspiring more people to sew. What a grand thing!
I don’t understand the lashing out of why this is such a bad thing. Why be bitter about it? That people from other companies got together to produce a sewing pattern of a 18th century design that’s been influenced (only) from a TV show – what’s wrong with this?
How is that bad??
It’s not, in my opinion.
I can understand that a costume design should be copyrighted from the designer’s personal point of view.
But this “red dress” pattern is not the same design. The lines are different and the pattern based more on historical references. The width of the skirt is completely not the same.
There’s some disconnect I see with the designer. To be honest, I don’t know much about her or her designs. I have watched Outlander. But I don’t know her history and what’s involved on her end.
[Sidenote: in my editing and research of this post I found this tweet (screenshot below) from Ms. Dresbach. Something doesn’t jive here when she’s complaining of a sewing pattern for cosplayers yet encouraging them to copy her designs………..]
I still can’t fathom the attack that happened in mid-April 2017 about this newly published pattern. (And rants not just from the costume designer.) And why is it NOW?
Why didn’t it happen when Lord of the Rings-inspired sewing patterns came out? Not only by Simplicity but McCalls and Butterick too. What about with other famous movies as well? Why this particular pattern?
It’s a bit disturbing. I can comprehend the designer (and others) wanting change. I can appreciate the change they want and to have their designs copyrighted.
If you draw a sketch, that sketch is copyrighted. Fashion and clothing is not copyrighted, though.
With this “red dress” pattern, Lauren based it more on 18th century fashion. She did her research. And the pattern was merely inspired by the famous Outlander costume. (According to her, Simplicity chose the color red for the pattern envelope garment. It has since been changed on their website.)
I’m sorry to see my friend Lauren and her company, American Duchess, along with Simplicity, get wrapped up in all of this. It saddens me as one who sews and loves to re-create historical garments and designs.
Let it go, I say. Move on. Generate new stuff.
If you are a designer, don’t start comparing yourself (which is what I see Ms. Dresbach doing with Lauren and Simplicity).
Comparison is the thief of joy and creativity.
You start comparing; you start complaining that other people are ripping you off. So what. Protect what’s rightfully yours but don’t let it consume your life.
Keep going and doing what you’re doing. Keep designing. Keep creating.
Because, you know, if it all burned down you’re only left with your knowledge, your skill. Use what you have today and keep moving forward. Don’t worry about what’s going on. Don’t try to drag it out. It doesn’t make for a good impression of yourself and squashes others at pursuing their creativity. And that makes for a very dark and depressing world.
Hi Jennifer,
I agree with you 100% Lauren was taking inspiration from the red dress not ripping it off!! As a fellow costumer this whole ordeal really saddens me. Inspiration is the root of historical costuming and cosplay. If we can’t have that, hobbies like this would cease to exist. Thank you so much for sharing your view even with all the backlash in the comments. It was very inspiring😀
I have so so many thoughts on this. As a costume designer, lover of historical clothing, and someone with an interest in historical reproduction clothing, this is a HARD HARD line. Which to be honest, you may say you understand but you really really don’t. This isn’t meant to hurt feelings, but in the article and comments there is a lot of blatant rudeness, lack of education, lack of understanding of the issue.
What’s the most upsetting about all of this is seeing how YOU all are responding. You clearly enjoy this woman’s work, but somehow you can’t feel bad for her when she feels her intellectual property/her creation was stolen/taken advantage of??? You are all acting like this was a personal attack on you. No one is saying that you made this mistake, no one wants to see America Duchess go out of business, but no one wants to see a woman’s designs ripped off. Which they were. I blame simplicity, had they said make it in any color but red I wouldn’t have blinked twice, but they went for the gut. They wanted to cater to cosplayers, thus the red and the other similarities. The dress may have different lines, fabrics ect. but it looks similar and its visual language is similar enough that it reminds you of the dress from the show. That’s most likely where the upset and problem is stemming from. Had it been blue I don’t think anyone would have cared, but it was red, like the dress in the show.
Some upset also comes from what goes into the design, designers are hired to design not to reinvent the wheel. So when you see a Dior inspired look, it came to be after most likely 6+ hours of conversation. They would talk and think about things like how would that look further the story or character, what is it saying to the audience, what does this mean for our visual langue of the show. Sometimes you also get directors, producers, production designers who latch onto certain ideas so strongly that you have to go with them. So sometimes historical inaccuracies you see are a sacrifice by the designer based on many different things. Design isn’t seeing a cool outfit and recreating it (Which depending on the outfit is hard itself), design is making sure that the clothing best supports the story and the characters and one dress might be 40 hours of thinking, 30 hours of research, 6 hours of drawing, 100 hours of construction, To then have that dress ripped off is a slap in the face.
There is a difference between recreating a dress you liked from the 1790s and recreating a costume from a movie set in 1790. Costume reproduction workers lead a very different life to costume designers. They seem similar but are super super different. You also can’t claim you are inspired by something and then get mad at someone else for being inspired by something else. Design is fluid, physical creation is not.
Also to add to the copyright thoughts and information….. PHYSICAL clothing can’t be copyrighted, but designs can be. Quick story, I assisted a designer who designed the costumes for a musical, the show closed and at the end of the day the producers owned the designs. That’s how it works in many places (for now) in theater, TV and film. But this isn’t always true. Anyways, the show reopened at a different location, all designs were reused but none of the designers were paid. Well, you might be thinking “If the producing company owns the designs they don’t have to pay the designer” Sorry bud that’s not true. In many contracts, reproductions or reuse of the design means that the designers but be credited and compensated. So sorry to bust your bubble but ever time you “recreate” a design of someone’s you could be stealing. No, you may not be chased down with a lawsuit but you still aren’t doing the right thing.
I urge you all to listen to this podcast where the costume designer of “Peter and the Star Catchers” talk about a similar issue.
This really does upset me, because it makes me feel that the wider costuming community doesn’t care about the people who inspire them, help them, give recognition ect. It makes me feel that costume designers are just here to keep you entertained and you don’t care about our work, only how it can benefit you.
I am so inspired by all the talented people I see who create and reproduce historical garments. But it a two-way street, you need to have respect for the designer and the situation. Just as designers have respect for you and your process
From the sewing community I believe we care a great deal about costume designers for film and shows and their hard work that goes into their projects. It’s wonderful when they share their process and even their own sources for inspiration. It allows the rest of us to find new places for ideas for our own works. There’s a nice symbiotic relationship between Hollywood designers and those consuming the final production who then go out to re-create what we see from being inspired and those at the “top” of the fashion chain (both fashion houses and Hollywood) viewing the general population (among other places of course) to receive their own inspiration.
Although, when the designers and studios show a lack of professionalism as they are trying to get recognized for their work it becomes a huge turnoff, unfortunately. Fighting for recognition (and rights) is important! How one goes about that reflects the willingness and degree of their cooperation to get changes made. Let’s ALL get to understanding that there’s nothing new and fashion will always be circular in the designs that are produced – by designers and publishers and re-creators alike. Together, perhaps, we can find a way so the “original” designers receive more recognition.
Also, the original design, at least in coming up with the idea and description of the Red Dress, is the author of the book, Diana Gabaldon. The book is quite descriptive of The Dress and it plays a fairly big plot point in the story. That may be why the Terry is making a thing about it. But it’s not her design… really.
I think you all are missing the point of her frustration and anger. She wasn’t consulted or included in the decision to copy her designs, she gets no profit from her working copied. and someone else is ripping her off. Designers HATE knock offs as well they should. they spend time and effort to create something and then someone else makes money off THEIR hard work creating a cheap copy. as artists yourselves creating wearable art, you should be more respectful of her problems and anger. YOU would be pissed as hell if someone showed up wearing a cheap unauthorized copy created from a pattern sold at Joannes that YOU had NO input in at all nor profit from. you know you would.
It IS frustrating for all designers. Look at Etsy and Ebay. Designers today have to market why they are different and their items higher quality. It’s also why it is so important to support independent designers and small businesses.
Dear Jennifer, I enjoy so much reading your information and sharing all the wonderful things you do in the fashion world and sewing , you’re gorgeous designs and beautiful pictures of them you’re gorgeous designs and beautiful pictures of them delight me . You are so Gifted and blessed us with all you do. You make my world so much better. I am not able to make these beautiful dresses and petticoats and and underwear yet but I look forward to the day you went spire me and blessed me and I just want to thank you so much! You are truly amazing and your pictures of you are gorgeous you are so special I look forward to everything you do and everything you share I just wanted to tell you thank you so much ❤️
Thank you Lo Lori. Glad you are a part of our Joyful Community. 🙂
Even if it were copyrighted–copyright law only requires 30% change to the original to be considered “original.” There is every chance that the Simplicity pattern is more than that, which would mean the show designer honestly wouldn’t have a leg to stand on, anyway. Furthermore, any copyrights involved, by standard contract in Hollywood, belong to THE STUDIO, not the designer. It’s not a red carpet dress, it’s a dress that was in a show. So honestly, the show designer wouldn’t see a dime even if the studio had told her to work with Simplicity or whatever, because the rights aren’t hers in the first place.
Sorry, this argument just doesn’t fly in this case.
Showed up where? In what context are you talking about? It’s not like people are showing up on set expecting to be filmed for the show wearing something they made form this pattern. So, I can only assume you’re talking about events, cons and the like. Which, I’m assuming you’ve never been to based on your comments. You also clearly don’t know anything about Jennifer to assume she’d be pissed if someone showed up in a cheap outfit. Why? Because Jennifer supports people who enjoy sewing historical clothing from ALL skill levels. Some us start out with badly drafted patterns and cheap fabrics, but everyone has to start off somewhere. You can bet I’m not going to spend $60/ yd on Duchess Satin as a beginner to (probably) screw it up. I’m willing to bet that Jennifer would be overjoyed to see that someone made an effort, mostly because Jennifer isn’t a petty toddler.
Nor, does it seem, that you know what you’re talking about for Terry’s side of the story either. Terry follows Lauren Stowell’s (the creator of the pattern) blog and knew damn well what was being planned because it was announced LONG before it was even released. And she seemingly had no issues with the other two patterns designed by Lauren and released by Simplicity.
And let’s not forget that Terry is contracted with Sony pictures, who own the rights to the Outlander film franchise. Terry couldn’t have been consulted or credited without Sony having a licensing agreement with Simplicity which they are a) unlikely to do and b) costs money and time that neither side is willing to spend.
There are a lot of conflicting opinions about how copyright can be asserted in sewing patterns, and I have yet to read an absolute statement on this. And I’ve read a lot about this over the years.
Official and unofficial costume patterns are the bedrock of my pattern collection; I can’t pass up a knock off. I do know that pattern companies have created ‘inspired by’ and “Licensed from” pattern lines off and on over the years. There are Star Wars homage patterns and official ones, dating back to Princess Leia’s hooded dress aka: Simplicity 8269 in 1977 (Pattern Vault has done some great research on this), Of particular interest to me are the Disney princess patterns, where McCalls has clearly made Anna and Elsa dresses and Simplicity has the official licensed patterns (rinse and repeat for all other princesses or superheroes). Andrea Schewe has had a long career in that field,
Dig deep enough and you’ll find all sorts. Personal new fave: the “inspired by Ross Hunter’s Lost Horizons” patterns. Now I know you’ve been waiting for THOSE your whole life…..or were you looking for the official Toxie costume from Troma’s Toxic Avenger? This well is deep and rich.
It comes down to intellectual property. Maybe she can’t stop people from recreating her designs, but clearly someone else is making money off her ideas. It’s the same as someone using a photo someone else took as their own. Sure that may be flattering to some, but I can also see how a designer might get mad at someone taking their design and selling it. Plus, I’m sorry, I think the AD design is unattractive. As a designer, I’d be offended. P.s. I didn’t like the original dress design either!
I think the Simplicity design is rather basic and I’m not a huge fan. I believe Lauren designed it – based on period examples – to be a starter base. Her post here has some terrific ideas to make it individual.
And Terry didn’t make money off the (very clearly) inspired Dior knock off dress? Sure, Terry mentioned on her blog that she was inspired by that specific dress, so, In a way, giving Dior credit. However, as far as I know Dior wasn’t mentioned in the credits of that episode nor did they receive any money from the design or profits from that episode. Lauren was never shy about saying that Terry’s designs inspired her and even linking to Terry’s blog posts about the red dress. In my opinion that’s apples to apples.
Well just bless her heart!!! 🙄 Isn’t she just too precious for words? 😉
If she’s. been a designer for that long she sure better know how the industry works by now. I mean honestly 🤦♀️ Yes costume designers are hard done by but does she have to act like such a brat? Unless she is actually a two year old, she needs to put on her big girl panties and work to change the system *in a professional manor*.
If she keeps acting the way she is now, she just may find it extremely difficult to find a job in the future.
I find it disingenuous for a designer to cry foul when a design is copied. It’s been a factor of fashion forever. I have patterns that I inherited from my aunt that are marketed at copies of outfits worn by particular actresses in particular films. It was common practice among the young ladies in my family to venture to the movies on Saturday, stop off at the fabric store on the way home and wear a copy of the dresses they’d seen in the film to church the next day — without a pattern! In more recent years, I recall a story about Gwyneth Paltrow’s now-iconic pink Oscar gown being copied by ready-to-wear before the show ended, in order to be on the racks by the next morning!
Furthermore, one must ask oneself where Terry Dresbach went for the designs for the show? She had to have consulted fashion plates, historical documents and the like to create the costumes for the show. I rather thing this is a tempest in a teapot. Even the great Edith Head’s trademark chevrons found their way on copied garments, and those are much more easily identifiable as belonging to an Edith Head design than the garments from the show Outlander are to Terry Dresbach.
Thank you for writing this. I don’t understand Terry Dresbach’s meltdown over the red dress, either, especially since the first two Outlander patterns were seemingly ignored by her. However, Terry spent a lot of blog space going on about Dior, the color red, and pictures of the red dress from every conceivable angle. Maybe this dress had some sort of personal meaning for her.
Besides you can’t really copyright a HISTORICAL movie garment. Maybe some Sci-fi outfit, but she’s copying from history too, just as anyone else would be, so how would she prove that it was her design–cause really it was never truly her design.
This is a big “hoop-la”. As a costume designer we have no rights. Terry Dresbach’s designs are her creations, yet the costumes belong to Sony. Something that must be tweaked in the costume design world. We have rights and we deserve credit where credit and royalties are due. As for cosplayer’s and Outlander, and any other popular show, these individuals are drafting their OWN patterns following the research of the film’s final product. In my mind, They, being cosplayers, SHOULD not be purchasing patterns. As Costume designer’s, if we have no draper, draft our own patterns from our own sketches. As for why her blog is down, we don’t know the real story, whatever it is simplicity insulted her creative intelligence. The gown pictured is TOO similar to hers and Sony’s creative and intellectual property. Another point I would like to make, is cosplayer’s have no financial gain. Simplicity does. And none of that gain is given to Terry Desbach. Anyone who outwardly states displeasure or lack of respect for her should be ashamed. If your a costume designer or technician you should be fighting for your rights and working to change the sytem.
I disagree with you on that cosplayers should only make their own patterns. Not everyone can draft clothing, it is a great way to get new people to cosplay and get into sewing. I think it is disingenuous to think this of Simplicity, they are enablers to this new major industry of Cosplay. Remember they have been doing this way before cosplaying was even a thing. Jennifer is right, when popular movies come out, there are always patterns for it. I remember doing Italian Renaissance because of Ever After. Simplicity was my first foray into historical costuming.
Also there are quite a few cosplayers who do make money. There are some cosplayers who are designing for the big pattern companies. So that statement isn’t quite true. Maybe Ms. Desbach is mad they didn’t ask her to design the patter. But to be perfectly honest about this dress in particular, I thought is was horrible on the show to begin with. But that is my issue with the designer throughout the show.
All I can say is that she better get over it and fast, as she will certainly make sure to anger the cosplay community and home sewers everywhere. After this rant, I am certainly not a fan of her work/attitude. Maybe it is easier for me just to stop watching the show too.
I follow Andrea Schewe’s blog who does a lot of the costume patterns for Simplicity and she talked about this in part when she was doing the official Frozen patterns licensed by Disney. Apparently another pattern company did a Frozen costume pattern which legally Simplicity could have sued over but they decided it wasn’t worth it, but then she had to do her patterns so exact to make it stand out from the other pattern. But you’re right, with a lot of movie knock off patterns they don’t have official designations or branding, probably because it hasn’t been that financially significant to the movie companies. Sounds like more of a personal issue to me. Poor Lauren.
There is no real way to copyright a clothing design. Clothing patterns come in a limited number of shapes. Those few shapes determine the look of the finished garment. But a sleeve is a sleeve whether it’s from Chanel, Givenchy or Wal-Mart–or is from the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the Victorian era, or next season’s Project Runway. The individuality comes from the color, the fabric, the cut, the sewing technique. Any attorney would show that the pattern was available everywhere.
My granddaughter aspires to be a costume designer. She wants to work in theater and films. I’ve advised her to sign, date, and put the copyright symbol every drawing–which you CAN do–because her designs are intellectual property and because that’s the part she’s getting paid for. But once the costume is made there’s little that can be done or the large companies like Simplicity or the movie studios would have acted on it long since.
I wasn’t even aware of this poo slinging. I am a huge fan of Lauren and Abbey. They have been more of an inspiration than Ms. Dresbach for me. Costume design are protected by copyright BUT not the garment. Since Lauren has based it off historical resources she is protected (depending if it goes to court which it shouldn’t). I remember a clothing designer tried to sue a costumer for copying her Viking apron dress pattern. A lot of people sent her pictures of their apron dresses, historical artifacts, etc to her to prove that an apron dress garment isn’t under the protection of copyright. It is like the stupid hoo-haw over the Firefly knitted hat for Jayne. It is a standard hat pattern not copyrightable. I can make these hats and sell them. I just can’t sell them at Jayne’s Hat or Firefly’s hat.
In addition to handling the whole situation poorly and instigating a witch hunt agains a small business owner, Terry is being a hypocrite. What is especially different about Terry copying Dior’s design for the New Look in Season 2, and Lauren copying the red dress in Outlander? They both were paid to to a job, and they both did that job by using elements of another designer’s iconic work, while not copying it exactly. Both dresses were obviously similar to the original designs they were inspired by, while being unique and different from the originals. They both gave credit to the original designers where/when they had power to, but the companies that paid Terry and Lauren for their designs didn’t give credit to the original designers on the packaging/end credits.
Terry also went after Lauren for posting her photos on her website (properly credited, though yeah, technically under copyright), while conveniently ignoring the fact that she did exactly the same thing on her own website by posting other designer’s photos that she was inspired by (uncredited, no permission either).
^^THIS
I understand some of Terry’s irritation with some of the historical costuming groups. Some of them are bashing her for not being more HA. This is a television show and one that has time travel involved, shake your heads people. I think her designs are fabulous and I wish I could make them all! However I don’t agree with her bashing American Duchess. It is an inspired design not a direct copy. If you want to take issue with someone do it with Simplicity.
The Outlander costuming is really superb under the guidelines of TV production and that it’s a fantasy story to begin with. Some of them are very lovely!
Has anyone asked Miss Terry and her husband about the famous Outlander tartan? How it was designed by a very nice person and then just taken without compliment or credit? Or compensation? Ask for the rest of the story!
Ouch! I’ve got to look into that one…
As a designer of knit wear, I know that the basic silhouette for most garments has already been done. The devil is in the details. Fabric, fiber, finishing all are uniquely a designer’ s choices. We all are guilty of not attributing designer’s work but it’s not ethical and we should all begin to give credit where credit is due. Someday it might be our designs filched. It’s especially galling when a huge corporation does it. Their deep pockets are hard to fight.
Some additional thoughts on how complex this is, however. I do find the fact that Terry was “inspired by” the Dior Bar Suit for one of Claire’s season two outfits fascinating. While there were obvious differences between the eras of the dresses, the entire look was lifted from Dior. But as an element of design, is it appropriation of Dior or is it simply inspired synthesis?
I’m not sure that there will ever be a completely right or wrong answer to this whole thing. There is mostly “What am I willing to do” as a designer, as a cosplayer, as a creator and as a consumer?
I don’t think the dress in the pattern and what I’ve seen of the dress in the series are similar enough to cry copyright infringement. If the pattern designer used the same inspiration as the costume designer, I’d expect them to be even MORE similar. By referencing the costume, the pattern designer ensured the pattern dress was different enough to not produce an exact copy.
I hate to say it but it sounds like someone attacked someone else’s revenue stream (or what she thought should be her revenue stream.)
Its all so murky. You should try sorting out what is and is not considered a derivative work in quilting. I’ve seen some downright nasty altercations over the years!
There is a lot of complicated history and feelings behind the scenes with film and tv costume designers regarding this issue. There is a tension among all sides regarding their legal and ethical rights that isn’t as clear cut as we might like it to be.
First an acknowledgement: American Duchess and Simplicity are within their legal rights to create “Inspired by” patterns on their own steam, using their own research and patterns. Simplicity and other pattern-makers have done so for years, as you pointed out. I am also glad that Lauren has had this opportunity to expand her brand and its economics.
But. . . economics. . .that’s what this ultimately comes down to. Stay with me, I’ll get there. But allow me to address several of your points:
Why the hoopla now, when there were earlier “Outlander Inspired” dresses? Well, the earlier dresses were not such blatent concoctions of a singular dress – a dress that actually affects the plot of the story somewhat. A dress that was described in detail in the books and has only ever really existed in the context of Outlander. The earlier patterns were more like costumes that could exist in the Outlander world without being specifically any one of the leading designs. (I mean, I could use those patterns for Poldark, too.) That’s probably why it floated past Terry’s outrage.
So yes, it is because it was the RED SATIN dress. A dress that Terry had to design specifically, not on historical garments, but from the book’s description alone. Lauren explained to Terry (on Twitter) that she had requested many changes for the court dress to Simplicity, but the things they insisted on were RED and SATIN. As a result of Terry’s objections (probably via Sony), Simplicity got the message and recalled the red dress envelopes and replaced them with a photo of the court dress in another color/fabric.
But all of this goes even deeper than just that. It goes into economic structures that traditionally take advantage of certain creative labor. You see, costume designers are one of the few creative artists on a film or TV show that do not receive any sort of royalties or residuals for their work (art directors and hair/makeup designers are in the same boat). Directors, producers, assistant directors, writers – all of these people integral to creating the content of a show- get paid extra money for every re-airing of the show, for every action figure or doll sold for the show, for every Happy Meal delivered with the show’s character on it. Every single one.
But what would those characters be without those iconic costumes? What would the world of the Hunger Games be without those inventive Capital costumes? The costumes are the most immediate piece of world-creation in a show, and the costume designers get paid only once for their time, talent and labor. And even at that, they don’t get paid all that well in the scheme of things (seriously).
All of those movies you mentioned, Titanic, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, The Matrix. . . the costume designers who created those amazing looks get paid nothing for those “Inspired by” patterns. They don’t even get to put their NAMES on them, so they can’t build their brand or notoriety as a costume designer. They get no credit whatsoever. They literally CANNOT put their names on them because of contractual obligations with the people they work for.
Their unions have been trying to negotiate better residual terms and better recognition opportunities for them for decades, but the’ve not won a stitch (so to speak). But they keep working, creating these amazing designs and ideas for our enjoyment.
So after years of working 18 hour days, far away from home, for months at a time, when a large corporation like Simplicity wants to make A LOT of money off of something that you figured out how to make in something resemling an 18th century style from an almost impossible description in a book (and trust me, the book’s description of that dress is really impossible to make!), they’re going to stamp AMERICAN DUCHESS at the bottom and you’re going to be cut out of it both economically and in terms of remuneration. . . and the pattern-maker (whose shoes you buy for the very show she’s “inspired by”) doesn’t even give you a courtesy email to tell you this is going to happen?. . . yeah, you get pretty hot.
And Terry is known for getting pretty hot. She’s passionate. For some people, she’s a little too much (even she admits that). She’s also very active in her union rights and fair trade, so the fact that a corporation gets to do this got under her skin. She recognized the legality of what they do and how they do it, but the ethics of it are in tension for her, since she’s the one – out of all of us – who will receive nothing from this. Simplicity gets profits, American Duchess gets to grow their brand, we get a great new court pattern. What does she get? Zilch.
As for Terry’s outlook regarding cosplayers: the reason she loves the cosplayers and not Simplicity is that most cosplayers are not making any money off of imitating her designs. They’re doing it because they are truly inspired by them. (I also think Lauren is passionate and inspired, so that’s not an issue for me). Terry has posted cosplayers in their versions of the Red Dress, and encouraged them.
She and Lauren at American Duchess eventually came to an understanding with one another (at least on Twitter). But I think even Lauren had to admit that she didn’t fully understand the depth and history of the feelings that go so deeply with TV and film costumers regarding these issues. They bubbled up now because, yes, this dress is a very specific dress for a very specific show.
In other words, it’s complicated.
Great thoughts. And I agree with you. I think the change can/should happen at the higher levels of contracts so designers get more recognition and even have a chance to grow their brand and name and possibly earn more.
The thing is… it’s not like costume designers have any copyright to the costumes to begin with. We don’t get a single red cent from official costume sales or action figures or any other profit generation based on our designs. We can’t even use our own designs to manufacture our own products. They belong solely to the production company.
So, Terry isn’t losing money because Simplicity is imitating her work. And she couldn’t make money -from- Simplicify imitating her work because her work belongs to the production company.
She got paid for the design, as per her contract, and gave up all rights to it when she did.
I don’t get it at all.
I’m all for increasing designers’ rights to our designs, but until that happens,
Well said comment. Thank you. And yes, increasing the rights is a good thing… HOW though is a complicated question and process.
“they’re going to stamp AMERICAN DUCHESS at the bottom and you’re going to be cut out of it both economically and in terms of remuneration. . . and the pattern-maker (whose shoes you buy for the very show she’s “inspired by”) doesn’t even give you a courtesy email to tell you this is going to happen?. . . yeah, you get pretty hot.”
This, right here. This is the crux of the issue that Terry appeared to have with it.
The people who think she was just trying to lash out at a small business owner because she’s a big hypocritical meanie are missing the point in all of this – that’s clearly The Red Dress From Outlander, and it has no mention of the show, Terry, or any other branding EXCEPT for Simplicity and American Duchess. In nearly any other creative situation this would be grounds for IP infringement, but since its costume design, it’s not illegal, so we just have to suck it up? I would be pissed off, too, if I woke up one day and saw something I designed that is so iconic, rebranded and marketed without my knowledge or permission.
I’m not a TD-sycophant but I understand where her anger comes from here.
“doesn’t even give you a courtesy email to tell you this is going to happen?”
How so? Lauren claims she got in touch with Terry on several occasions, and Terry herself follows Laurens blog where she talked repeatedly about planning the dress, the design, and eventually a post in which her and Abbey go to Simplicity headquarters in New York and spot the red dress they created in one of the production rooms. This pattern was NEVER a secret.
How does copyright work in cases like this? I know in my world of commercial sculpture, I would not retain any rights at all to my work as the sculptor. That’s the wonder of “work for hire”. If that is the case here, I imagine the studio would be the only one who could possibly have grounds for any infringement claim (if such a thing were even possible). As the sculptor, I get paid once when I make the sculpture, and unless my contract specifies otherwise, that is the end of it. The company I did the work for is responsible for enforcing their copyright and trademarks, not me, and in fact I would have no right to do so. Is it that different in other design fields?
That sounds right. But clothing (even in film) is not under copyright (as far as I know for film/TV). Ms. Dresbach was paid by Sony for her designs. It would be them against Simplicity if they thought there was a copyright issue. Again, clothing isn’t copyrightable at this point.
A costume design isn’t clothing, it’s considered a work of art for copyright purposes. So it most certainly is protected.
The design itself IS copyrighted and Sony owns those as they paid the designer for her work under contract. However, the finished dress is not copyrightable as a “utilitarian” item.
Intent counts, and Simplicity very clearly had the intent to present the pattern as a copy of Terry’s (and Sony’s) design. Otherwise it wouldn’t have been done in red satin.
See that’s the thing. Of course Simplicity had the intent to release a pattern in the vein as the red dress from Outlander. It is *no different* than the Titanic pattern I show in this post. That just happens to be a Simplicity pattern, too. But all the Big 3 commercial pattern publishers release patterns based on popular shows and movies. And the red dress pattern is not a direct copy of Ms. Dresbach’s design. It’s meant to have the flavor of it so the sewing community can use the pattern for their own 18th century costuming projects.
My whole post focuses around why *this* dress pattern? Why not the hundreds of patterns released in the last century? It is SO very common for pattern companies to release their own versions of popular designs. You see it in Hollywood productions down to red carpet award show gowns. You can bet the most popular styles will have a sewing pattern version based on how another pattern drafter views the gown or ensemble and creates a new pattern that can be graded to various sizes and released to the home sewing industry. Ms. Dresbach’s response to this one sewing pattern being released is baffling. Considering the whole production of it was not kept secret nor is any different than other popular movie and TV show designs having sewing patterns based on their costumes.
Terry Dresbach seems to have issues with costumers in general and historical costumers in particular. The Frock Flicks blog did a write up on each episode discussing the historical inspiration of the costumes.Ms. Dresbach was apparently very upset that people were analyzing her costumes (not in a mean way) and showed up quite frequently in the comments acting very defensive and angry. I also saw her show up in other sites doing the same thing, especially on the posts about the red dress. It seemed very unprofessional to me to trawl sites discussing the costumes and responding commenters in such condescending and defensive manner. She also made quite a few pointed comments on interviews about people she thought were too hung up on historical accuracy. It seems like she really wants to alienate a lot people who would be a big part a Outlander’s fan base, namely cosplayers and people interested in historical costumes. Her attitude really turned me off on the show even though I used to love the books back in the day.
I was also astounded to learn from a Q&A that she also doesn’t know how to sew and she’s been a costume designer for over 20 years.
I had a conversation with a professional costume designer you will know from Costume College. According to her, costume designs are copyrighted for a period of 25 years. Thanks to the Sonny Bono law, the copyright holder (Sony in the case of Outlander) can file another 25 year extension. Simplicity chose to make the styling,etc very clearly reference Outlander, and then they didn’t reference Terry. I had an online convo with Terry, and she said that the Outlander costume shop had supported American Duchess by buying a lot of their product for the show. She would have appreciated a heads up, a request, any kind of word from AD/Lauren first before the pattern was launched. She is tired of costume designers as a whole not getting credit when their work gets knocked off, and that includes by the copyright holding studios that don’t acknowledge the original designers when merchandising the cheap Halloween copies. Simplicity knew what they were doing when they “invited” American Duchess to create the pattern. They knew if there was any fallout that Lauren would get the blame. At the end of the day, it’s two big corporations who are going to be fighting over rights (because, as you know Sony is officially licensing Outlander product, some that does credit Terry, like the Abby Shot coat). Terry has often talked about how design/costuming is the “ghetto” for creative women in the film industry. The creatives there don’t have the same protections that composers or writers get, they don’t receive residuals like actors or composers/writers/directors/producers. Yes, people who are new to sewing depend on these sorts of patterns for roadmaps to creating a facsimile of their favorite character’s looks, the issues are more complicated. Part of it is an industry that makes obscene amounts of money hand over fist, and doesn’t share it equally with all the creatives involved in its process. This just happened to come up when Terry was in the midst of work, probably on the wrong day, and as someone who was raised on social justice, she spoke out. Simplicity has the resources to license the designs from Sony. Look at all their Disney/Marvel official patterns. Why they chose not to is a question for their legal department.
I’d like to see the court rule for costume designs being copyrighted and for that length of time.
Nope – costume designs cannot be copyright. No clothing / fashion / costume can be copyrighted because they are considered “utilitarian” simply because they are clothing. Whether it’s a wild haute couture piece or an elaborate historical item, & the case law was specifically decided against companies who created animal mascot costumes. Details in my article here.
That said, I do wonder why Simplicity got a blogger to ripoff these TV costumes instead of using their in-house designers. And the promotion was a bit tacky. Usually, when the Big 3 pattern companies do their takes on movie/TV/cartoon costumes, they don’t draw extra attention to the fact & just roll them out without making specific reference to the source media. A great example is how Andrea Schewe has provided tips on the Game of Thrones patterns she designed for Simplicity on her blog — she doesn’t say “Game of Thrones” anywhere, but you know what they are — just one of them.
Thanks for the link on your copyright article. I refer back to it every so often as it’s well written so “the rest of us” can figure out the legality of costume design.
Costume designs, meaning the drawings and sketches of the costume are protected under copyright similar to how other drawn artwork is protected. However the dress itself is not protected. There have been many times I have looked at a photo of a garment and have basically recreated it. Now I know I did not use the same construction techniques and I’m sure I made the fit a little different based on my likes and body shape or other reasons. In this instance, this is just what American Duchess did. As far as the licensing comment, that is moot. Licensing would only have to be done if that pattern claimed to be an officially licensed pattern of the Outlander series, It was INSPIRED by not COPIED.
Thank you Jennifer for an interesting and well thought-out post. Glad you did something you “don’t normally do” 🙂
Excellent post- I’ve been asking a lot of the same questions. I find it a bit disingenuous on the part of Terry Dresbach since she was publicly silent when simplicity created the first two patterns. Maybe she figured that she was losing out on a revenue stream (which I find really laughable considering her husband is the show’s producer so it’s not like she’s not making bank), maybe she was simply offended. In any event, if she felt she was wronged, she could have simply got the lawyers involved (won’t be the first time someone’s used the treat of litigation as a bullying tactic).
And I have to love Ms. Dresbach’s whining about taking her blog pictures down…if you didn’t want them out there in internet land, why did you post them in the first place?
In the end, knock-offs have been a fact of life in the fashion industry ever since there’s been a fashion industry so it’s nothing new. I find the controversy laughable although Simplicity’s action changing the dress color strikes me as somewhat cowardly (probably their legal people advised them to do it). The sad part is that the one who really stands to get burned is Lauren/American Duchess since I doubt that she’s got the legal resources if this gets any uglier. If nothing else, it will certainly have a chilling effect on future endeavors.
I’d suggest that the showrunner being her husband has nothing to do with her being properly remunerated for her own work. As the producer, HE is making bank. As the costume designer, she most definitely is not. Whether and how they combine their incomes is none of anyone else’s business. His work is his work. Her work is hers.