Loulou Bontemps‘ latest work with Guy Ritchie is pure, substantial eye candy. The costume designer behind The Gentlemen and The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare simply makes characters pop off the screen. In the entertaining Netflix series, she created a world of style audiences wish they could experience on the daily.
The Emmy-contender, as she noted to Immersive Media, is thankful for her team making such an alluring vision come to life. “I have a huge, brilliant team who make magic happen,” Bontemps said. “I don’t do this on my own. It’s all about making these great characters, these key looks, these different gangs, these different groups. When the Motley Crew is together, and they all still look absolutely fantastic together, you’ve done the job. That’s what I’m really proud of.”
The costume designer, who regularly shares behind-the-scenes photos and tidbits about her process on Instagram, told Immersive Media about some of the many beautiful costumes in The Gentlemen.
Let’s start with the suits in The Gentlemen. Obviously, Guy and you know what makes a good suit. What brands and styles did you want in the show?
Well, Guy’s more into style than fashion. When I have conversations with him, it won’t be about particular brands, it’ll be about the quality of fabrics. He knows and loves the world of bespoke. So for example, with Stanley Johnson played by Giancarlo Esposito, he is a billionaire and everything is bespoke. The attention to detail is immaculate. With him, everything had to be comfortably tailored, beautifully done.
Stanley’s wardrobe is a mixture of some brands I then fitted and altered for him. A lot of it is bespoke to beautiful watches, earth worth an absolute fortune. And then with the Theo James‘ character, Eddie, there’s this whole arc of style through his character from beginning to end. With Guy, a comfortable gentleman is somebody who can walk around in a suit and feel very assertive and at ease.
In the beginning, Eddie is this humble soldier, so he’s wearing clothing for function rather than fashion. And then as he’s hanging out with all these different people and he’s discovering the gangster inside him, he’s slowly embracing that culture and that British country fashion that he grew up in then has this gangster element to it. And then, he gets into this world of bespoke suits. I think all men look beautiful in a three piece suit, but Theo definitely pulled that off beautifully and embraced the gentleman gangster that he became.
I imagine working with actors working with you on a Guy Ritchie project, they must have some confidence they’re going to look good, right?
I think they’re all nervous. Unless you’ve worked with Guy before, I think it’s quite intimidating because he’s created this world and reputation. Every time I meet a new actor who hasn’t worked with him, it is an opportunity to warn them to be prepared for anything because Guy is not your stereotypical director. He won’t go by the book.
You’ll be given a script as an outline, but it won’t be what you shoot on the day. A lot of actors aren’t really prepared for that. A lot of them embrace it, a lot of them struggle with it. But then when you meet Guy, he’s so embracing and he really gets you involved. It’s like a whole collaboration for me as a designer, and then for an actor is creating a character. So it’s a wild, crazy, fun adventure.
Well, I just really enjoy how colorful the work you do is. So many movies and shows are shy of having a lot of color now. What were the colors that you and Guy discuss for The Gentlemen?
Absolutely. I think there’s a time for color, and there are times when Guy will be brave about it and think it’s appropriate. And there are times when he’s like, “Tone it down, tone it down.” Also, you’re working with your production designer who’s created this whole color palette and mood for the sets. And then you’ve got the director of photography and with his lighting and everything, we create this whole creative concept for the whole show.
But I’m very fortunate that Guy is brave and he likes to be pushed. He likes to explore his boundaries, especially when it comes to style and color. And then Martyn John, the production designer, is just obsessed with color. Most directors of photography are scared of color, whereas Ed absolutely loves it and embraces it. So, I’m very fortunate as the costume designer, and I love color, fabric, and the drama. I’m working with a team of people who all celebrate that, too, at the right moment. There’s always the right moment and the wrong moment, and it’s got to work in every situation. Color is a wonderful, powerful thing.
The one character whose style is chaotic is Freddy’s. He’s like a chaotic, shaggy posh child. How did you want to make his style as flawed as that character?
I mean, just imagine a posh boy growing up and just dressing like his dad essentially. He’s probably wearing some of his dad’s clothes. I mean, I’ve met hundreds of Freddy’s in the UK all around London. They’re everywhere. When you go to the posh areas, for sure, utterly chaotic, have no sense of style, just so lackadaisical. It is almost like they seem so dilapidated the way they dress themselves.
At the same time, he loves to play dress up. The chicken costume was an unintentional dress up, but he puts on the fur coat for Fight Night because he thinks he’s a gangster. He thinks he’s Brad Pitt in Fight Club. And then, you’ve got him playing dress up when he is pretending to be Ukrainian or Russian or whatever it was, and he’s got the turtleneck and the hurling overcoat. There’s the sense of fun, but it is believable. I think when Americans watch it, they think, wow, that’s pretty eccentric and crazy. But if you are British and you’ve met these people, you’re like, “Yeah, I know Freddy. We all know of Freddy.”
I meet those kind of characters in LA where I think, they have all this money, yet they can’t buy style.
Exactly, and that’s an interesting conversation that I had with Guy. Every time he goes to these events, he is like, “Wow, they’re super rich and have no idea of style.” I think there’s that difference there with the British aristocracy where they might own an estate, but it doesn’t make them wealthy and they really do dress like their surroundings. I just wanted him to kind of be part of the furniture at the manor. What is he doing still living there? He’s married. Why is he always there? So, it was important that he really blended in with the house in a way.
Creatively, how did you and Guy first connect and realize you share similar sensibilities?
The Covenant was the first film that I did with him, and that wasn’t a world where it was stylized or heightened. It was very important to make sure that that was accurate and respectful. So creatively, we didn’t really have fun there in that world, but it was very much like he could see the work was done and the research was done, and he was like, “Okay, great.”
When we started talking about The Gentleman and I put together my boards and I’ve got the scripts, the first two episodes which he directed, I sat with him and just presented it all. With Guy, he loves the fun element without it being too much of a parody. There were moments where I was like, “I think this would be fun here.” And then I literally just lay everything on his table, this long table and all my boards are out, all these different key characters and key moments, fabric, samples, feathers, everything.
How do you two talk about character at that initial stage?
We talk about them as human beings, who they are, where do they hang out, what would they be wearing, where do they go on holiday, what do they eat for breakfast? He really wants to dig into the depth of who each character is. He wants to make sure it’s Guy’s heightened and stylized world, but at the same time, believable, plausible. The moment you cross that line with Guy, he’s like, “No.” It’s a fine line.
With Guy, you can talk and talk and talk and you have great ideas, but he has to see it in the flesh. So, it was day one, and I think it was a scene with Eddie and Freddy, and they’re two completely different looks. Guy was just like, “This is it. That’s it. This is exactly what I wanted.” He changed Freddy’s collar a little bit. I think he untucked it or whatever from that moment onwards.
Guy might say, “Well, I want to try this.” Most of the time I’ll agree. Sometimes I’ll be like, “Can we try something else?” He’s very collaborative. He’ll fight you on something if he doesn’t agree, but he will let you win if you can win him over with it. So, we’ve got to that place already now. Guy is just the bottomless pit of knowledge and fascination and you can talk to him about everything and nothing.
That’s a nice way of putting it. Going back to the bespoke suits, say for Stanley Johnson, did you have conversations with Giancarlo Esposito about how best to wear them and what goes well with them?
It was wonderful working with Giancarlo. He’s such a wild human being. He’s so brilliant. I love to have Zoom calls with actors before I meet them in person because it gives me an opportunity to present my ideas, to talk about what Guy wants, and to hear the input that they have about their character. With Giancarlo, we had this wonderful Zoom. He was completely in the zone. It was very important to me because he’s another gangster in the show and he’s the American gangster, the billionaire.
We decided that he was from the East Coast, but I wanted this kind of rich Hollywood-type of style in order for him to look very different to everybody else. Guy absolutely loved that. There were references like Clark Gable. There was this wonderful picture of Clark Gable I found where he’s shopping for watches and he’s wearing this beautiful houndstooth blazer, and he’s got a cable knit sweater over his shoulder. Guy was like, “I love sweaters on shoulders.” It suddenly became his new obsession. You’re probably going to start noticing that more often in some of my characters.
I was reading that the ’40s and ’50s are your favorite time in style or fashion, however you want to put it. As a costume designer, what about those decades speak to your eye?
I think it’s kind of like the rules started to break in fashion. Gabrielle Chanel and Christian Dior started to break women out of corsets. Gabrielle Chanel, she was wearing men’s clothes and just breaking all of the rules. You can see through fashion history, there’s always been a rule, a kind of uniform for women to wear, and it slowly evolved depending on the environment and depending on politically what was going on at the time.
I love the change of silhouette from the ’30s to the ’40s. It’s a little bit more liberating for women. I also think that it’s a silhouette that is really flattering on women. So, it went away from it just being clothing that women are told that they kind of have to wear to it to almost celebrating this female silhouette. A lot of women made their own clothes as well in the ’40s, which is really charming and something that I would love to come back into fashion.
You can find original ’30s, ’40s and ’50s dresses where you can see they’ve made the clothing themselves. To me, it makes it completely unique to itself. If you can find something that’s the only one that exists, it’s just a bonus. It’s extra precious and extra wonderful to be able to find that and use it.
When it comes to Susie’s wardrobe, I used a lot of vintage clothing. A lot of it was like vintage designer or just one-off pieces. To me, that just added that extra va-va-voom knowing that people might want to recreate it, but they can’t just go to a shop and buy it.
You’re the first person I’ve heard say va-va-voom in a long time.
It’s the French in me, Jack [Laughs].
With Susie, she’s always fiercely individual in how she presents herself. How did you want to convey her adaptability in the crime world and just her individuality?
Well, she definitely goes a little bit more country and tweedy when she goes to the countryside. And then, when she’s in London and you see her at her boxing gym and going to these fights and she’s about town, you can see that it’s a little bit more gangster. It’s a little bit more London leathers, beautiful furs. And then, we have one vulnerable moment towards the end where she’s in her flat and she’s working out, and that’s the only time you see Susie without all her makeup, without heels on.
With Susie, we needed to have that consistency. She’s assertive. She’s the strong boss lady, and Guy wanted her to remain consistent throughout the whole thing. He’s like, “She is the gangster of the show. It’s not Eddie. She is.” And then, by the end of it, there is a possibility that Eddie really is the gangster and he’s either on her level or about to become that.
She’s such a powerful presence. I thought a lot of what she wears as almost like a uniform, even an armor .
I think if you see a woman in London walking around, it’s not just what she’s wearing, but it’s how she’s wearing it. The way Kaya played Susie was so confident. You’re right, it’s a uniform, but it’s more like body armor. It is her armor. She’s not revealing really anything other than the fact that she’s strong, she’s powerful, she’s got this wonderful silhouette that we’ve created.
It’s kind of a dream wardrobe. I’ve been inundated with messages from women saying, “I want you to dress me. I want a wardrobe. I want all of it.” It’s wonderful, because it is a celebration of London style, I believe, which is that mixture of vintage and luxury fashion as well. And then, celebrating her silhouette and her shape and having someone just making it seem effortless when actually a huge amount of work went into all of it.
Speaking o fall the effort that went into The Gentlemen, any co-workers you want to give a shout-out to?
I have this amazing maker. She’s the one that made the chicken costume, which we’ve called Cock Couture. India [Chetta-Roberts] made three of them all bespoke from scratch. I gave her a drawing of the cockerel outfit. I just kind of created this vibe, chose the feathers, and I was like, “There you go, make three of them.” She worked so incredibly hard. She did such a phenomenal job. I was so sure that that look was going to be such a hit. I was so excited for it. She deserves all the love because that’s one of the looks that’s had the most attention on the show. It’s down to her hard work and making my vision come to life.
Check back soon for more from our interview with Loulou Bontemps.
