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'Ending up on the worst dressed list hurts:' the downside of red carpet fashion

In the age of the meme, the aftermath of a red carpet event like the Oscars can be brutal: a celebrity’s dress can be morphed into an omelette in minutes and uploaded to a worst dressed list before they even step off the red carpet.

Worst dressed lists are the priority during awards season for many celebrity websites because they always garner huge numbers. An editor at one such site explains that their worst dressed gallery is always the best performing story across the entire site globally. “When working for a celebrity website, there's nothing better than a red carpet full of disastrously dressed women. The bad cut of Jennifer Lawrence's dress and hideously sheer design of Rita Ora's gown means thousands more clicks, engagement and comments from the vilifying public," one told us anonymously.

But what does Hollywood make of this red carpet grading system? "I hate them because it's so mean," celebrity stylist Cher Coulter, who works with Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, tells The Telegraph. "Everyone likes to slag other people off, because they feel better by saying beautiful people look terrible. But thanks to the emergence of these lists, things that should stay in people's heads are there in black and white for the whole world to see online. The world we live in now is so judgmental and so passive, everyone behind a screen like, 'Look at them! Look at them! It's just ugly I think. Celebrities have feelings too."

Photo: purple bridesmaid dresses

But whilst stars might be hurt to end up on a worst dressed list, Coulter insists that they try not to take them to heart. "I think you have to really look at who is judging them. You're just looking into someone's own thought bubble. They might not be fashion people or people who understand fashion," she says.

Stylist Manny, who has worked with Cara Delevingne and Jourdan Dunn, agrees: "It’s easy to mock things that audiences don’t fully understand, in the same way people may not see why a certain piece of art is so expensive and sought after if you are not from that world."

Whilst being on a best dressed list can lead to more film roles - Sienna Miller's stylist Kate Young famously said her on screen renaissance was thanks to her style revival - Coulter insists featuring on a worst dressed list is very unlikely to impact an actress' career. "If it's someone making comedy mistakes again and again they probably don't care and if it's someone of such high calibre, like a Cate Blanchett, being on a worst dressed list one time doesn't touch them either," she says. "It's probably the people in the middle who aren't really being who they want to be that it effects. But if you're aiming for mass market you're not going to be on the worst dressed list, and you're not going to be on any list... you're going to be on the safe list."

The lesson? That publicity is publicity; even if your dress is likened to a meat feast pizza (like Rihanna's Met Gala gown). "It's always something like the Angelina split - it was still a great dress and got people talking because there was a leg. It's not a bad thing. It's still press," stylist Manny adds. "Being on a worst dressed list is a powerful tool to grab headlines. I sure some people actively look to be on worst dressed lists as it can put you on the map."

Nonetheless, stylists do admit that the red carpet is becoming increasingly bland thanks to the explosion of worst-dressed lists. "What it stops is people being individual. That's why they start looking the same. It's boring," Coulter tells us. "For me, Gucci is the most exciting thing to happen to fashion recently, and that's quite hard to reinterpret, but it's so cool and just what fashion needs. We need to see colour and print, because otherwise everyone is going to be in a bodycon dress."

Ironically, worst dressed lists aren't merely a bi-product of traffic-led websites, they were invented before the internet in 1964 by (surprise, surprise) a man. Designer Richard Blackwell set up his Annual Worst Dressed List in 1964 as an alternative to publicist Eleanor Lambert's International Best Dressed List and a way to promote his own label. The late designer would invite reporters to a breakfast at his Hollywood home on the second Tuesday in January, and would reveal the 10 celebrities who made it onto his list.

If you think commenters on Twitter can be unforgiving, Richard was more Joan Rivers than Joan Rivers. He wrote remarks such as “she looks like a masculine Bride of Frankenstein”; “she looks like a gypsy abandoned by a caravan” and “an over-the-hill Cruella DeVille.”

And whilst he might have called himself the "worst b**** in the world", Blackwell insists he never meant to be cruel. “My list is and was a satirical look at the fashion flops of the year,” he explained. “I merely said out loud what others were whispering. It’s not my intention to hurt the feelings of those people. It’s to put down the clothing they’re wearing.”

He stressed to the Los Angeles Times that he really didn't mean to upset the women on his list. "Maybe I should have named the 10 worst designers instead of blaming the women who wear their clothes."

But decades later, here we are still blaming the women who wear the clothes.

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