Helena Bonham Carter, wife of equally eccentric Tim Burton, doesn't do button-down boring. She mixes wacky styles, wild colors & sometimes, two different shoes.Her covert costume while filming 'Harry Potter'
Her new movie, 'Dark Shadows,' is now in theaters
Since her first big roles in "Lady Jane" and "A Room With a View" in the mid-'80s, Helena Bonham Carter has been known for her unique talent and beautifully quirky stage presence. Now 46 and married to Tim Burton in one of the most stylistically compatible relationships in the history of Hollywood, Helena has also become
revered -- and maybe a little bit feared -- for her affection for fabrics that jut off in gravity-defying directions, prints that take British staples like tartan to new heights, and left and right shoes that appear to have come from different planets. Given Burton and Carter's shared affection for all things outré, it's no wonder that his sets and costumes sometimes seem to recall her red carpet ensembles.
As we count down to the release of the uniquely cool couple's latest collaboration, "Dark Shadows," let's take a closer look at Helena's eye-popping history of far-out fashions .
Looking rather wispy and dovelike herself, Helena Bonham Carter enjoyed her Best Actress nomination for her turn in "The Wings of the Dove," at the 70th Academy Awards in Los Angeles on March 23, 1998. Though understated, the princess-sized waistline and voluminous billows of satin seen in her early Oscars gown choice offered a '90-era hint of at her forthcoming
passion for corset fashion.
The only traditional thing about Helena's 2011 Golden Globes getup was that she stuck to her formula of wearing billowing, black fabric from her waist to her ankles. Beyond that, her multicolored, multidimensional Vivienne Westwood dress involved what appeared to be horns coming off the bodice and a shape resembling a seat for a small child, which protruded from her middle.
One green and one red shoe completed the look, which remains uniquely Helena's.
Five years after her pink-on-pink velvet and fur jacket made its first public outing, Helena found a more low-key rose-colored, fur-emblazoned blazer to wear on a walk with her baby around North London on April 16, 2005.
At the world premiere of "Fight Club" in 1999, Helena went for a more severe than usual top -- in taut, red satin. But she kept the bottom loose and flowery. Fitting with the underground, street rumble-premise of the flick, her color of choice was naturally power red.
Helena looked mischievously in love in a peek-a-boo taupe, flowered dress as she arrived at a New York screening of "Planet of the Apes," the film she was making when she became involved with its director, Tim Burton.
Still enamored of floor-skimming styles and heavy fabrics, Helena brightened up a thick, black skirt with a fuzzy, pink jacket at the "Love's Labour's Lost" premiere in London on March 15, 2000. Wearing an asymmetrical faux fur, hot pink collar over crushed velvet (in a different shade of pink), the actress looked ready to wait out a Technicolor, red-carpet winter.
Ruffled, cinched, veiled and pinned, Helena's outfit suggested a flirty schoolmarm with a penchant for petals when she arrived at the premiere of "The Importance of Being Earnest" at London's Odeon West End Theater on Sept. 4, 2002. Stacked heels and an embellished jacket collar added an extra kick to her diminutive flair.
At her appearance for the "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" premiere in 2005, Helena paired sequin-studded tiers of black ruffles with a choker and bracelet dripping in black roses. And while black is appropriate given the theme of the film -- which centers on a bunch of greedy kids who meet grotesquely candy-related ends -- that tongue sure made her look ready for a square of Willy
Wonka's spooky chocolate.
In a surprising twist, Helena donned a lime-green dress, which appeared to have waistlines at both the waist and the ankles, for a stroll in North London on May 24, 2007. Adding to the curious ankle-area attention? A pair of white tennis shoes and the thickets of white socks. Hey, there's no shame in comfort!
Every once in a while, even Helena's favorite black skirts need a punch of color. At a photo call for "the Corpse Bride" in 2005, Helena gussied up her black vestments with a lacy red apron and sunshine-colored cardigan.
What better way to celebrate "The King's Speech" than with one of the U.K.'s most traditional patterns? Helena matched a black bottom with a red tartan top at the BFI London Film Festival in 2011.
At another photo op promoting "The King's Speech" in London in 2011, Helena eschewed the tartan gown in favor of an all-over plaid skirted suit. Horn-rimmed glasses completed the serious-minded look.
Multiple fabrics and textures in taupe, combined with her wavy, auburn up-do, gave Helena a romantic air at the 2007 "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" premiere in London. One of her most ravishing gowns, the dress showed off her svelte figure -- while her black boots added a tinge of requisite darkness.
Rocking a poufed-up knee-length skirt and marionette-esque white top, Helena Bonham-Carter did her best doll impression the London premiere of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" on July 7, 2009.
Helena's purple satin prom dress look for the premiere of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1" in London appeared to give her some kind of bad high school flashback on Nov. 11, 2010.
In homage to her creepy Red Queen character in "Alice in Wonderland," Helena rocked trippy puffed sleeves over an Alice-shaped cream gown at the film's London premiere in 2010.
You can take the Brit out of Great Britain, but Helena couldn't help but wave a flag in honor of her native England beneath the generous serving of black skirts that flowed from her 2011 Oscars gown.
When she met Queen Elizabeth II at a 2012 celebration of Charles Dickens' birthday, Helena wasn't afraid of showing a little leg beneath her trademark black skirt. Luckily, what fabric she lacked below the knee she made up for above the head.
In black lace, black boots and a feminine, Dickens-inspired top, Helena looked serene as she and Tim Burton took in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition Party in London, on June 6, 2007.
Helena's love of black skirts took a different kind of poufy turn at the 2011 Screen Actors Guild Awards: 3-D. Fabric bunches shot up in various directions from the actress's black-and-white cookie-esque gown at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.
