Prom dresses make bold statement beyond trends

Some dresses are memorable: Michelle Obama’s inaugural gown, Coco Chanel’s little black prom dress, Cher’s Oscar get-ups. They make an impression on culture beyond fashion.
InStyle fashion director Hal Rubenstein counts down his favorites in the new book 100 Unforgettable Dresses.
“Dresses are important for different reasons, but how they are unified is that they are not all simply about fashion,” he said. “They hit us emotionally, psychologically or affect how we perceive beauty.”

A great dress can also jump-start a career, he said, and that’s not just limited to fashion. Mrs. Obama’s white, One-shoulder Prom Dresses for the inaugural balls literally made Jason Wu a household name overnight, but stars as diverse as Phyllis Diller and Elizabeth Hurley have parlayed a splash of style into celebrity.
The Gianni Versace safety-pin gown that Hurley wore in 1994 for the premiere of Four Weddings and a Funeral is the first dress featured in the book.
“The Versace safety-pin dress is the greatest example of the power of clothing,” Rubenstein said. “It made a woman famous overnight. Elizabeth Hurley was a pretty girl on Hugh Grant’s arm who no one knew. The next day it was ‘Who’s that girl?’  ”
Modern A-list celebrities Sarah Jessica Parker and Cate Blanchett join style icons Audrey Hepburn, Jacqueline Kennedy and Grace Kelly as women who successfully made fashion part of their identity, Rubenstein said.
Kennedy figured out how to use clothing as a political tool. With her appearance in France at Versailles in 1961 in an ivory gown with floral beading on the bodice by Hubert de Givenchy, she changed the world’s perception of how a new generation of Americans might dress.
Every dress in the book tells a story, and that’s why, at 35,000 words, it’s more for reference than for the coffee table, Rubenstein said.
“Three-quarters of these have been stuck in my head my whole life. I didn’t need to find the 100 dresses; 75 of them just showed up in just a couple of minutes after I had the idea.”