Passage 2
The popularity of award-show fashion has practically eclipsed the award shows themselves. For the 2017 Oscars, the Network devoted an entire broadcast day to the red carpet, starting with a morning “pre-pre-show" called “Countdown to the Red Carpet"followed by the hours-long "Live from the Red Carpet." For designers, the red carpet is one of the most visible and popular ways to promote their brands. In fact, some top designers will pay A-list actresses and musicians big bucks to wear their dress or jewelry. Other celebrities are allowed to "borrow" a designer dress, handbag or diamond-studded necklace for the night-for free of course-in order to get the designer's name in the highly clickable red carpet photo slideshows.
But what happens to that very expensive dress when the red carpet is rolled up and the TV cameras move on to the next event? Is the gown stuffed into a closet never to be worn again, or does the designer take it down to the dry cleaner and try to sell it on websites? We reached out to Ariana Weisner, a Hollywood stylist, for some answers. Weisner says that
99.99 percent of the dresses loaned out for award shows go right back to the designer.According to Weisner, on rare occasions, the designer will gift the celebrity the gown. Themost famous example was the green Versace dress that Jennifer Lopez wore to the 2000Grammys. Versace gifted her the dress, because it was such an iconic moment, and the dress is still in Jennifer's closet.
"The really big design houses will take back a red-carpet dress and keep it in their archives," says Weisner. "You won't see a 'statement' gown from the Oscars resold to the public, dry-cleaned or not. But that's not the case for lower-tier designers." Weisner cites the rise of fashion rental companies in Los Angeles and New York for this trend. Less conspicuous red-carpet dresses could very well end up in shops a few years after a big event.Sample sales are another place where you might stumble upon a dress that a celebrity wore for one big night. When a designer's warehouse becomes overstuffed with leftovers from last year's line, and sample-sized dresses that were tried on repeatedly in the store, they hold a sample sale. Sometimes you can get a dress from a sample sale that a celebrity has worn in the past. They're usually pretty cheap, too, because it's already been used.
Even if you can't get the very same dress that a celebrity wore on the red carpet, you might be able to buy an exact copy. Every once in a while, says Weisner, a dress at an award show is picked up for mass production. One example is a silver dress that Kate Hudson wore to the 2016 Vanity Fair Oscars post-party. The designer sells the same dress online for ,325.
Really luxurious dresses not only grab the attention of viewers, but also thieves. At the
2015 Oscars, actress Lupita Nyong'o wore a white gown studded with 6,000 pearls worth an estimated ,000. The gown was reported stolen from Nyong'o's hotel the day after the Oscars, but was then mysteriously "returned" by the thief. According to TMZ News, after the burglar snatched the gown, he removed two pearls and took them down to the garment district.They were fakes! The thief dumped the “worthless" dress in a bathroom back at the hotel and informed TMZ of its location.
What happens to the red carpet dresses by less-known designers according to Weisner?
A、 They are returned to their designers and kept in their archives.
B、 They are rolled up and stuffed into closets for the next event.
C、 They are given as gifts to the celebrities.
D、 They are rented or resold to the public.
【正确答案】：D
