Costume Design Hunger Games District 12

The Hunger Games District 12: A World without Color

Judianna Makovsky the costume designer of The Hunger Games talks about the ideas behind her design choices in the opening scene in an interview with Vogue Magazine:

"We wanted to make a very serious impact, and color was very important—to keep it mostly gray or blue . . . very cold because coal leaves a black dust everywhere. But we didn't want it so overly stylized that it wasn't a real place—it is a real place—it could be Appalachia, you know, a hundred or fifty years ago (Creeden)."

I established my depiction of the citizens of District 12 from the poverty and disconnectedness that Suzanne Collins describes in the book . The distant relationship between the Capitol and District 12 cripples the growth of District 12 into a world with color and priviledge. The relationship holds them back stylistically into the dress of coal miners from the 1950s. District 12's impoverished conditions are a further extension of a stagnant development that doesn't allow the district's citizens to grow out of these bluish or gray costumes to afford the luxuries of color.

(KatnissEverdeen PeetaMellark)

In the opening scene I wanted to capture the distinct spatial difference between District 12 and the Capitol as it relates to how Suzanne Collins portrays District 12 as the farthest district from the Capitol. Katniss gives insight to the poor relationship between the Capitol and District 12 in the novel when she discusses aher childhood thoughts: "When I was younger, I scared my mother to death, the things I would blurt out about District 12, about the people who rule our country, Panem, from the far-off city called the Capitol (Collins 6)." The gap between the powerful Capitol and the peasants of District 12 created a great distance between how people in the Capitol looked, dressed, acted. The members of District 12 even see the Capitol as too distant of a idea to grasp at times. The Capitol in many regards is a city that members of District 12 only know about because of its ability to rule. The citizens of District 12 only sees representatives of the Capitol like Effie Trinket,whom exemplifies this difference in how she dresses, looks, and acts at the time of the reaping.

I wanted to convey the distant relationship between the Capitol and District 12 in the opening scenes of the film at the infamous reaping. I dressed Effie in a more elegant and colorful dress that fits the personality described by Collins. I portrayed the members of District 12 to be stuck in a 1950s coal mining era of blues and greys. This emphasizes the distance of the members of the Capitol and District 12 as I felt that members of District 12 were so far removed and could never really get out because their only glimpse at fashion forward couture would come from being exposed to people of the Capitol at the reaping.

Suzanne Collins stresses the idea of District 12 being one of the more impoverished districts with its citizens possessing fewer privileges than people of other districts, such as District 1. I explored Collins ideas as she paints District 12 as an impoverished place with "squat gray houses, "and a place "where you can starve to death (Collins 6)." I envisioned a District that was stuck in a time warp and forgotten about, that hadn't seen the advances that privilege could bring you. District 12 wasn't an area where they were worried about TV and other things, but instead they were simply trying to survive. The luxury of color was not something of importance for these people as they simply worried about working hard enough to put food on the table and often falling short at even that. Therefore, the grays and faded blue gave that hard working feel to the citizens of District 12 as they toiled in the mines.

Overall, my vision was to paint District 12 how I saw it through the lens of the images Suzanne Collin's gives us. I also felt that it was very important to keep in mind the relations between District 12 and The Capitol when I made my costume design choice. I wanted to make sure the costumes had the essence of a rugged, hardworking, and distant district.

Collins, Suzanne. The Hunger Games. Reprint edition. Scholastic Press, 2010. Print.

Creeden, Molly. «Dressing The Hunger Games: Costume Designer Judianna Makovsky». Vogue. N.p., s. f. Web. 8 feb. 2017.

KatnissEverdeen PeetaMellark. The Hunger Games: Katniss and Peeta Reaping Scene [HD]. N.p. Film.