Lets continue on the topic of past costumes/school projects.

The summer of 2011 I attended a class in “Teatre costume design”.
It was only a short course (three weeks), and just a few students attending, but it was great.

The play that we were asked to costume was George Bizet’s opera “Carmen”.
A few weeks before the course we got the assignment to read the play, listen to the music and make a inspirational board of some kind.

This is my board.

The the real work begun.
We spent the first week working on our drawing techniques, the next making mood boards, gathering inspiration and designing the costumes for three of the main characters.
Carmen

Escamillo

Don José

Michaela

It wasn’t until week three we actually got to start working on the outfits.
Corset for Carmen (Pattern from Jill Salens “Corsets”)

Flowery decorations

And even though we only needed to make costumes for two of the caracters (Carmen and Escamilo) it was pretty hectic getting everything done until the weekends presentation.

Escamillos jacket and Carmens skirt finished.

We also had some lessons in theater history, breaking down scripts and stage make-up. Åsa (the teacher) shows how to change the lines of the face.

Me, Hanna and Keit working on our make-up skills.

On Friday the last week, we had a workshop with dancers and opera singers wearing our clothes, and on Saturday we held an open house to show of our work.Hanna working on getting the stage ready for the show.

My “show room” with collages and pictures of the costumes.

And a small model of the set and stage.

Me getting the costume on the dancer before the show.

In part 2, I will show you my finished costume, as well as the costumes the other girls did.