Edward Stevenson (13 May 1906-2 December 1968)

birth place:         Pocatello, USA
birth date:           13 May 1906
zodiac sign:         taurus
death place:        Los Angeles, USA
death date:          2 December 1968

Profile of Edward Stevenson

​Edward Stevenson was American costume designer with over 200 films and television designing credits and had won one Academy Award for his design. The film Citizen Kane (1941) and It`s a wonderful life were perhaps the most famous films in which he was costume design, and his most long time client was American actress Lucille Ball.

Life of Edward Stevenson

​In 1924, Stevenson began working as a sketch artist for Norma Talmadge’s production company, and he was also allowed to submit his own designs. One Stevenson design mentioned in numerous accounts is a silver gown worn by Barbara LaMarr in The White Moth (1924).

Carole Lombard gown

Edward Stevenson’s first contract as a designer was signed in 1928 with First National Pictures, Inc., then one of the largest theater chains and movie studios in the United States with Warner Brothers having controlling interest, but when Warner Brothers purchased First National Pictures, Stevenson was out of job, and became free lancer for the next few years. 

Rosalind-Russell dress designed by Edward Stevenson, 1935

In 1935, Stevenson was hired by RKO as sketch artist, working for other designers and promoted to designer next year, and would work there as RKO´s head designer in its costume and wardrobe department for the most of the next 13 years until 1949.

It was during this period Stevenson had designed costumes for films that become Hollywood classics, like Gunga Din (1939), Citizen Kane (1939), Love Affair (1939), and Alfred Hitchcock’s Suspicion (1941).

1941: Suspicion by Alfred Hitchcock

Joan Fontaine dress designed by Edward Stevenson in Suspicion by Alfred Hitchcock, 1941

Joan Fontaine sleeping gown designed by Edward Stevenson in Suspicion by Alfred Hitchcock, 1941

Joan Fontaine suit designed by Edward Stevenson in Suspicion by Alfred Hitchcock, 1941

Ginger Rogers sweater with heart in movie ¨Carefree¨designed by Edward Stevenson

I love Lucy

Lucille Ball

After his contract expired in 1950, Edward Stevenson left RKO. 

Sometimes in mid 1950s, he started working with Lucille Ball, a former movie actress who had worked with Stevenson in the heyday of RKO for her TV show I love Lucy. Stevenson would work exclusively with Lucille since 1960 until his death of Coronary in 1968. And while working on a Lucille film, The Facts of Life (1960), Stevenson won his solitary Acadamy Award for Black and White Costume Design.