I Used to Design Costumes, but Stopped

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I used to design costumes but stopped in 1995.  My final designs were at the Children’s Theater of Minneapolis.  They had a wonderful costume shop, but I told them that I would no longer do shoes and underwear, so a wonderful person did them for me.  I had had enough.

I started designing costumes in high school, as the drama teacher was more interested in costumes than scenery.  As I had grown up in a house where sewing was taught to us, it wasn’t a great stretch, and after a few mistakes, I actually did quite well.  Along the way, one learned about cutting and execution, and the small town frustrations of finding theatrically useful fabric.

In college, Brown University, I designed and cut  the costumes for “Carousel” ” and other musicals, then also plays.  I went to Pawtucket, R. I. and bought a 40 dollar repossessed Singer.  I eventually sewed drops on it as well.  I taught myself how to make patterns on a dummy, and coming from a house of home sewers where we made Halloween costumes from the beginning, and used Vogue and Simplicity patterns , it wasn’t much of a mystery.  The real mystery is how I found the time to make that many costumes while designing scenery and going to classes full time as well.  But I did it.  

Arriving at Yale, I leant towards scenery and costumes more than lighting. I did well in the costume construction class, so continued designing costumes, and sometimes was a costume cutter. Cutting costumes and making patterns was so similar to drafting scenery as one had to imagine how pieces would go together to become the whole shape.  As it turned out, I was way more interested in designing and making costumes, especially period costumes, than “modern dress.”  I wasn’t as versatile in costume as I was in scenery. 

I have to admit, after going to a Korean wig store in New Haven many times, that , being offered membership in the “Queen Wig Club” was a bit of an assault on my masculine ego. I was good with my hands and could arrange wigs, but…this was a step too far for me ……

Once in New York, I made costumes on the floor of my apartment and learned all the fabric stores to go to, which was useful for scenery design as well.  I was surrounded by wonderful costume designers, though, and felt myself stymied and a bit embarrassed by my low budget efforts. Once I had seen some really good modern dress design, like from Jennifer von Mayrhauser at Circle Repertory Company, I realized I just wasn’t as interested in ALL of costume design.  I continued doing period shows out of town in theaters with good costume shops.  I enjoyed it, but it was not my choice of career.  And the underwear and shoes were no longer interesting to me, the way they should have been.  I did many beautiful gowns in the style of Winterhalter on Maria Ewing as the Perichole at San Francisco Spring Opera, but the maestro stopped rehearsal to complain of the male chorus’s shoes. That was the beginning of the end…….

Once upon a time I designed costumes.