October 20, 2008

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Mr. Blackwell, the acerbic designer whose annual worst-dressed list skewered the fashion felonies of celebrities from Zsa Zsa Gabor to Britney Spears, has died. He was 86.

Publicist Harlan Boll says Blackwell died Sunday of complications from an intestinal infection.

Blackwell, whose first name was Richard, was a little-known dress designer when he issued his first tongue-in-cheek criticism of Hollywood fashion disasters for 1960 -- long before Joan Rivers and others turned such ridicule into a daily affair.

Year after year, he would take Hollywood's reigning stars and other celebrities to task for failing to dress in what he thought was the way they should.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)