BEHOLD! COSTUMES! (Patreon)

Hello again, my dear strange and wonderful patrons!

“What? Hearing again from you so soon?” I hear you all saying to yourselves.

Yes, I know, unusual — BUT, I realized that the shows I’m doing tonight, tomorrow, and Sunday in Toronto as part of a mixed program of Ontario artists means that I’m technically publicly premiering Barbette … AND I HAVEN’T EVEN SHOWN YOU THE COSTUMES YET!

I’m chipping away at editing some “Atelier Barbette” vlogs that will unwind the tale of the last four weeks of rehearsals, creation, music composition, and costume construction in more detail BUT those won’t be ready for another couple weeks.

I wanted to make sure you — dear patrons — were seeing some of these details before things start flying around the internet. 

Without further ado – BEHOLD!  Let’s go from closest-to-the-skin costumes outwards (towards the Big White Dress you’ve already seen):

* * * * * * * 

LAST LAYER: 

Michael Slack and I looked at a lot of old reference photos and illustrated advertisements from the late 1800s and early 1900s for both men’s’ and women’s’ undergarments for this layer. 

There's tights that I wear with this, and I also added in some canvas split-sole jazz boots in the same colour / shade upon the suggestion of Stacy Clark as an 11th-hour artistic advisement session to ~tie everything together~. Those shoes will probably change in the end, as my ballet teacher (Isabeau) said she thought they looked like they restrict my toe point a bit / make the ends of my lines a little less nice. 

We mixed different finishes (satin, matte, ribbed, smooth) of elastic to bring texture to the garment. (Michael even hand-wove the elastic into that quilted section you can see in the last detail photo). We added D-rings and straps to echo some of the strappy girdles popular at the time. The bottom front of the garment is ‘blank’ because, well … 😉

These photos are from across the range of fittings and construction sessions in  various costume studios across Montréal in the month of April.

We decided to add in one more circle of elastic on my waist in the photos below (post-April 27th end-of-residency presentation) because the original waistline (of the lighter beige elastic) was cutting into my hard-earned aerial-straps obliques in a way that was giving me a funny muffin top by the end of the act.

This whole piece is A LOTTA HEAVY ELASTIC and I'm HELD. IN. 😅

NEXT LAYER: The green “burlesque” layer, on top of the above costume…

We drew on old archival photographs of Barbette in her strappy little 2-piece for this set. The bra in particular is quite close: we were debating on whether or not to give the cups a little more shape and structure (heck, maybe I’ll change my mind down the road), but we went with keeping them very flat because it felt right for that barely-there 1920s flapper aesthetic;

We wanted there to be a bit more colour to the overall world of the costumes, so we took some liberties in exploring some rich absinthe greens that felt right for 1920s/1930s colour palettes instead of staying in the world of gold and beige Barbette’s originally probably was. Michael took some super-durable stretch material and hand-painted / treated the fabric to get that beautiful aged green you can see in one of the detail photos below;

We went with lots of pearl and Swarovski embellishment as a nod to the illustration of Barbette for her WINTERGARTEN poster where she’s looking coyly over her shoulder, dripping in pearls;

The pant bottoms are a quickchange garment: sewn together with a clever fishing-line system and carefully crocheted back together after each and every single run of the act.

NEXT LAYER: "BALLERINE" DRESS

For some reason i DONT have that many photos of the “Ballerine” dress that lives on top of the green layer and under the Big White Dress, but I do have the following lovely detail shot for now, and this slightly out-of-focus shot of it on the mannequin before it was fit to me and finished. We added tassles, swarovskis, and cut the hemline of the skirt to have leg slits to add more movement to the garment during the piece.

And finally, I have the headpiece —

You’ll recall from an earlier “Armoire de Barbette” vlog that my mum made the base of this cap. I did everything else! (Even the ginkgo leaf appliqués!)

BONUS PICTURE: This is my favourite behind-the-scenes snap from Thursday April 27th.

This was me getting into costume to get ready for my end-of-TOHU-residency in the back hallway of the École Nationale de Cirque in Montréal QC. There was 24 folks waiting for me on the other side of that cinderblock wall – I presented a run of the act to them and had some lovely feedback from them afterwards.

This was the first time I saw "Barbette" outside the pins and clips and stitches and odds and ends of the costume atelier: we finished these costume pieces quite literally the day prior. (And went on to go back in and adjust them once more before filming the following Monday).  

I think it's beautiful.

By the way: 

I have some footage from the dress rehearsals leading up to the end-of-residency presentation on Thursday April 27th, and there will probably be footage from the shows I'm doing tonight, tomorrow night, and Sunday afternoon in Toronto -- but my videographer told me she'll have the runs from my Monday May 1st filming day at Le Monastère with full lighting and beautiful camera movement for me to review this weekend, and I'm holding out for THOSE ... for the first "full look" you folks can have of this project you've been supporting for so long.

Until next time, stay strange & wonderful --

XO Ess