The Anti-Cannes: How Sundance Became Fashion’s Most Interesting Film Festival

 The Sundance Film Festival has been at home alongside a mountain in Park City, Utah during the peak of winter for over 40 years. It differs from its contemporary film festivals for two reasons: weather and location. The two elements that dictate the way people decide to get dressed also fall into those factors. Where are you going? And what is the temperature you must prepare yourself for?Sundance, because of its cold-weather conditions, becomes an event that requires a utilitarian uniform of sorts. Think parkas, down jackets, and fur coats vs. the tuxedos and ball gowns that dominate a place like the Cannes Film Festival, which comes with its own (outdated?) dress codes. The Utah festival’s less glamorous grounds make for some of the most interesting outfits on a film calendar filled with red carpets and premieres and photo calls. Eugene Hernandez, the director of Sundance, told me what makes the festival compelling when it comes to style is the “unknown factor” of the weather. He said, “You can have a plan, and then the weather can adjust that plan which allows for some fun.”Sundance has provided a plethora of iconic looks over its 40 year run in Park City. While attending this year on behalf of Hypebeast, some festivalgoers I spoke to were reminiscing of the early ‘00s Y2K era of fits. Deja Williams, a publicist at a PR company representing key names in the film industry, told me that “the early 2000s really sells the Sundance dream” and informs how she dresses at the festival today. Some key looks she highlighted were Bob Dylan at the Masked and Anonymous premiere in 2003, Lucy Liu for Lucky Number Slevin in 2006, Chloë Sevigny, Penelope Cruz… “That decade literally carried the torch for festival fashion favorites that have gone down in history,” said Williams.You can’t talk about Sundance style without mentioning its late eponymous founder, Robert Redford, who was a menswear icon himself. With 2026 being the first festival after the passing of Redford, as well as the very last to be held in Utah, a heartfelt tribute was shown before each film screening — memorializing his valiant dedication to independent cinema. One look featured in the dedication clip that stood out to Janicza Bravo, Sundance Jury member and director of the 2020 crime comedy Zola, was Redford adorned in double denim. She explained, “The image is seared into my mind.” The perfectly fit and lived-in look was something she thought was “effortless” on Redford’s part. In our discussions about this outfit, we both agreed that Olivia Wilde and Chris Pine might have been paying homage to the Redford uniform at this year’s festival. You can see Pine tucked a denim shirt into a matching pair of jeans and held it together with a brown Western belt. Wilde channeled a similar look, but topped it off with a pair of oversized thin wired frames, eerily similar to a pair once made famous by the Sundance Kid himself. She even included an image of Robert Re