Ascot Gavotte; set and costume design for 'My Fair Lady'

After seeing the first theatre production of Pygmalion in 1913 Cecil Beaton spent much of his childhood creating imaginative designs for costumes and stage sets. In 1956 these designs provided the foundations for the costumes for Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe's stage production of My Fair Lady that opened later that same year in New York. The Sunday Times stated in 1958 after the play had hit the West End in London, that Beaton's vividly dramatic black and white costumes had a 'luxury, elegance and beauty that largely contributed to its being the most successful musical play of the century'. Beaton's experience with the stage production and the world of fashion, combined with his knowledge of photography, confirmed him as the obvious choice for designer of both the sets and the costumes for the highly successful and much-loved film version (1964), for which Beaton won two Oscars for costume design and art direction.