The Woman Behind The Cat Dress: Elizabeth Taylor and Helen Rose

By the time Cat on a Hot Tin Roof went into production in 1958, costume designer Helen Rose had already spent a decade dressing Elizabeth Taylor. Over the years, Helen would go on to shape some of the most iconic looks in Elizabeth's career — but it was the Tennessee Williams adaptation that produced the collaboration's most famous piece.

Elizabeth and Helen first worked together on 1948's A Date with Judy, when Elizabeth was still, in Helen's words, "a very pretty, happy school girl." From there, the two became very good friends. Just two years later, Helen designed the wedding gown Elizabeth wore on screen in Father of the Bride (1950). Elizabeth loved it so much that she asked Helen to design her actual wedding dress for her marriage to Conrad "Nicky" Hilton, which took place mere days before the film premiered. MGM leaned into the publicity, and the dress became a sensation in its own right, copied by fashion houses across New York almost as soon as audiences saw it.

Image: MPTV

Through the mid-1950s, Helen continued to dress Elizabeth across a run of films — including Rhapsody and The Last Time I Saw Paris, both released in 1954. Then, the opportunity arose to work together again, this time on Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. "Working with Elizabeth and [Director] Richard Brooks gave me something to look forward to with great pleasure, though the film was not exactly a designer's dream," Helen recalled. "There were only three changes of wardrobe in the entire picture; a slip, a skirt and blouse, and a short, simple afternoon frock which was worn throughout most of the film."

Richard had approved the first two costumes without issue. But for the simple dress, he suggested a shirtwaist — buttoned front, tailored collar, defined waist. Knowing this wouldn't flatter Elizabeth, Helen sketched an alternative: a chiffon dress with a draped Grecian bodice and a short, full skirt. Both designs went to the dressmaker, but with time running short before shooting began, only the shirtwaist was ready when Elizabeth arrived for her fitting.

Helen recalled how Elizabeth's face fell the moment she saw herself in the mirror. Elizabeth changed into the shell-pink satin and lace slip underneath before Brooks arrived — and, utterly disarmed by her beauty, he told her to wear whatever made her happy, so long as it stayed simple. Helen brought out the Grecian sketch, and the wardrobe department worked through the night so filming could begin on schedule. The finished dress fit, in Helen's words, as though Elizabeth "was poured into it," without a single wrinkle.

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The design became known simply as The Cat Dress, and soon became a trendsetting style. Under the Helen Rose label, the Cat Dress went on to sell by the thousands, in every size and color. Helen later said her success in commercial design was "all due to my friend, Elizabeth, who had a mind of her own, and Richard, who was man enough to let a beautiful woman change his."

By this point, Helen's relationship with Elizabeth extended well past fittings and film sets. She was present through some of the most difficult moments of Elizabeth's life, including the sudden death of Mike Todd in 1958. She remembered Elizabeth as someone who felt others' pain as deeply as her own — reaching out to comfort friends even in the depths of her own grief.

"I had seen Elizabeth go through four marriages before she reached the age of thirty," Helen wrote. "I had watched her rise to become one of the most beautiful and talented actresses of this era. She has risen about as high as any professional in the film industry, and she has had more illness, more unhappiness than any person should have to endure in one lifetime. She has also been ecstatically happy for brief moments, but through it all she has remained beautiful and with the stamina to endure."

Image: MPTV

Helen and Elizabeth collaborated for the last time on Butterfield 8 (1960), a role Elizabeth initially resisted but would go on to win her first Academy Award for best actress. Helen called the black chiffon dress worn by Elizabeth as Gloria Wandrous 'almost another Cat' — and, like its predecessor, the design became one of her most sought-after styles.

Nearly seven decades after Cat on a Hot Tin Roof was released, the Cat Dress remains a pivotal moment in on-screen fashion — and one that could only have been the result of a true friendship. Elizabeth herself said as much, in the note she wrote for the foreword of Helen Rose's memoir:

“To a super lady. A super designer. And best of all — my super friend! Love you always.”

Quotes from Just Make Them Beautiful: The Many Worlds of a Designing Woman by Helen Rose (1976).