Dressing A Galaxy by Rick (FWD) Mccallum, Trisha Biggar (2005)

First off, I love this book! Second so will any starwars fan or costume designer. I would say the let down for me with this book is it's lack of description on the costumes pictured, there are occasional notes on technique and fabric, but only for the more complex of costumes, more of the designers notes would have been nice.

As for the book itself, it is divided up into sections Jedi vs Sith, Royalty, Military Wear, The Galactic Senate, Slaves rouges and bounty hunters and Padmes Journey. Each chapter then focuses on the costumes contained within those catagories. At the start of each chapter are some designers sketches and some note, which is a nice addition, as it enables you to see the designers vision as well as the final outcome.

Most of the book focuses on the later more recently made films, with many of the high profile costumes featured in high resolution, although there are smaller photos contained within the various chapters with some of the older costumes from the original films.

The largest section really is based around padme, not all of her gowns are features, and it would have been nice to see a few more detailed pictures, but non-the-less they are still stunning gowns, and the quality of the photography shows very well the types of fabrics used and the embelishments.

And for those with good eyesight, at the back of the book, is a range of pretty much all the costumes thoughout the films, but they are very small, and for details you might need to use a magnifying glass!

One point to note, is that some of the CGI creatures are also included, although obviously the costumes are not created from real fabrics, it makes a good addition to any costumier looking to re-create some of the CGI charater costumes.

Overall, I would highly recommend this book, and if nothing else, the pictures certainly make it worth purchasing!

LOVE the book although it didn't give you all the costumes. It wasn't a surprise when it didn't feature the costumes from the original saga, and didn't put all of queen amidalas outfits, but it's still very satisfying. About the finger stains...it was very depressing that after 3 months of trying not to touch the pages, the oil from my fingertips ended up staining the pages which had black backrounds, but then my mother found a way to take them off, by "fogging" on the stains with your mouth and, by using a nice cloth fabric, you rub it out by doing a gentle circular motion.
(i hope this helps the first reviewer ;])