Clementine Alexander – Page 4 – 2024-2025 placement adventures!

First week with Kingsley

For my first week, I’ve just been at the studio for 3 days. I had a little tour and met the other people working in the space. Kelsie is Kingsley’s full-time assistant, then he has a few people working on a casual basis sewing; George, Sarah, and Katie. Another costume maker Katy Adeney also uses the studio, they each have half of the room and split the rent + business rates.

The studio is very chatty and everyone has known each other for a long time. George and Kelsie met at uni then Katie and a few others worked together for a season at Dorset Theatre. In contrast, the work is very professional and made to a specific standard.

As a freelancer working for costume supervisors, the costume quality are being judged by costume designers and supervisors, not just by audiences watching them in a show. That means all work produced needs to be of a certain standard of quality, inside and out.

For Kingsley to gain an understanding of my skill level and for me to learn the standard methods used at the studio, I repaired some old corduroy trousers and made a twill pair from scratch. I was at first worried about “failing the test” but quickly realised I’m confident enough in most of the processes and it was completely fine to ask for clarification on preferred methods for specific tasks.

Preparing for my new placement with Kingsley Hall

After finishing at the Lyric Friday, I have a free Monday before I start with Kingsley Hall, a freelance costume tailor tomorrow.

I’m excited to work with him as I specialised in tailoring for my projects last year and I look forward to experiencing the freelancing side of the costume industry.

At the Lyric for one of Abonaza’s costumes, we commissioned a freelancer to make a wrestling suit and cap. Harry decided achieving the vision would not be worth the time it would take us and getting it made out of house by someone specialising in lycra bodysuits would be a good use of the budget.

From our perspective, they had a few phone calls and sent the design, measurements & fabric. A week later the costume and an invoice were delivered. Now I’ll get to see what it’s like on the freelancers’s side, creating costumes from measurements remotely and juggling different projects for different clients.

Preparation

To remind myself of the terminology, processes and stitches used in tailoring I revisited my submissions from my second year and went to the library to look through the tailoring resources there. Knowing we’d be working on Hamilton, I also looked into mid-18th century fashion and patterns.

Lyric Hammersmith – Week 6 (Tech Week) Log

The last week before the show goes onstage.
– finishing the last bits of the costumes before they are used on stage
– last-minute adjustments to fit while actors are on lunch/ dinner break

I found it quite exhausting working for so long, standard tech week hours are 10am-10pm ish every day until previews are over.

Even at this late point in production, I was surprised the designers were still undecided on several things, particularly the main parts of Jasmin’s costume. The director also gave a lot of notes, some of which we were unable to act of due lack of to time and budget. As costume supervisor, Harry delegated what was achievable with our resources.
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Abonaza Costume Process Photo Gallery

Costume design (iteration 1) by Good Teeth

Shera Costume Process Album

Lyric Hammersmith – Week 5 & 6 Log

Week 5:

I modified the Ebonaza costume to accoding to the new itteration of the design to be more masculine:
-created a suspender style attachments for the cape so it doesnt distort the lighterweight shirt

Fitted the shera dress, corset and cape on Eman. Fitting adjustments were pinned using safeltry pins, photos were taken, then i drew a measurement diagram incase the pins were lost. James the designer was there to see the fitting, how fabric choices look together and approve the costume. This fitting was very successful and a more positive experience, I think this was due to;
Eman being more positive and considerate of the work put into the costumes at the early stage
James being there to disscuss design decisions and character interpretation with Eman.

Week 6:

Modified Shera fit and finished the dress
Made boot coveres for Emans act 1 and act 2 shoes
Added the boning channels to the corset then the gold applique design and resin gemstone
All the foam wigs were delivered and she gave us a little tutorial on how she made them using a heat gun.

Lyric Hammersmith – Week 4 Log

Monday Chats about networking & finance

Harry and I went through a few of his contacts in the costume industry who he has worked with before and who I could potentially contact about doing a placement. This was so helpful as i find researching and contacting people in the industry so nerve-wracking. It was also great to see the network of freelance costume makers across London as most of my online research into placements came up with more established theatres and costume hire companies than individual makers.

I also had a chat with Charlotte, head of finance, who gave me some advice about expense reports, invoices and when i need to register as self employed. This was great as i had no idea the threshold for registration was as low as £1000 in a tax year and generally has made me feel more confident about the financial possibility of charging for my work/ going forward in my career.

I feel quite frustrated that only now am i learning about invoices and being self employed as i think this financial literacy should have been taught in secondary school or the first 2 years at Wimbledon. Many students i know had already started freelancing or selling their work by year 2 and to leave this essential information out of the course seems negligent to the reality of working in creative industries where freelancing is the norm.

Going into this placement, i thought most people working in the theatre industry were employed by the theatre or tour company but speaking with the plthe wardrobe team for Raisin in the Sun and Charlotte i realised most are on short term contracts and technically self employed. While it seems exhausting to constantly be hunting for the next gig, there are some advantages like being able to move around parts of the uk and Europe by finding jobs in different cities and the strong network of contacts you build from working on so many projects.

Week 4’s other tasks:

I patterned a smock and cloak for Ebonaza’s coronation outfit based on Andrews measurements.
Prepared the fur for the cloak by cutting 12”strips and sewed on the sparkly “ermine tails”
Constructed the smock and cloak ready for a fitting
Jodie and Eman had their measurements updated
Joined a production team meeting – each department shares how they are going and any questions or concerns are raised. Things like adjustments for relaxed performances and closed caption performances were discussed .
Fitted The Ebonaza coronation costume:

Thoughts on the Ebonaza Fitting:
– Overall it didnt go as well as hoped and the energy in the room was very low.
– For the most part Andrew the actor disliked the design. Rather than a coronation robe he felt the fabric choice was giving 60’s mini dress and made some insensitive comments about feeling like a man in a dress and comparisons to Greyson Perry.
– It was difficult to navigate this as we feltthis was an accurate representation of the design and neither of the designerswere present to give their viewpoints. Even though I understood some of the comments It was quite demoralising having such a bad reaction to my work, especially when the notes were not something i as an interpreter could respond to. In the end we completed the fitting and requested a meeting to disscuss with the designers next week.

Lyric Hammersmith – Week 3 Log

Monday – I met James, one of the designers, and we went fabric sourcing on Goldhawk Road with Harry. They’ve gone on many trips previously so had samples and were looking for fabrics that paired well with what they’d already bought so I couldn’t input much into the discussions. However It was great to see collaboration between designer and maker, how they make decisions and discuss their different perspectives.

Tuesday and Wednesday – I continued working on the Shera look. I cut the fabric out then constructed the dress and corset to be ready to fit Eman next week.

The Shera dame design and Ebonaza king design both featured decorative gems and suggested casting them in resin to achieve a sparkly look. I have made resin jewellery and charms for a few years and want to bring this skill into my costume practice.

Lyric Workroom Tour

Lyric Hammersmith – Week 1 & 2 Log

My first week was spent helping out with odd costume jobs for shows other than the panto and getting familiar with the people who work at the Lyric.

Our Countries Good:
– It had just finished on stage so I helped Kyle with some of the laundry tasks. Most items were washed and tumble-dried, non-washables were sprayed with isopropyl alcohol and then left in a hot box to dry. – The hired coats from Angels had some fit modifications that I unpicked paired a few seams and resewed buttons before Harry returned them.

Father Christmas suits:
– 3 new suits needed to be made that matched the previous costume. I worked with Kyle to follow the original pattern and construction method. We overlocked all pieces, washed them to check for shrinkage then sewed 3 coats and 2 pairs of trousers.
– We ran into issues with our coat the necklines being much smaller than the previous year’s coat – perhaps it was changed during a fitting and not translated to the patterns? Ideally, we would modify the neckline to match and make it more comfortable for the actor wearing a beard but without the designer present, we left it as is.
– The jacket sleeves were also left unfinished and without any fur so fittings on the actors could be completed first.

Starting work on Aladdin:
– I spoke with Harry who had allocated the costumes between him, Kyle and me. I began planning the Shera dame costume, breaking it down into elements I needed to make and what i would use. The fabrics had already been purchased but decisions like the choice to make the middle section a boned corset instead of a part of the dress were up to me.
– I started the pattern process by drafting a block based on Eman’s measurements. It wasn’t easy though, as the measurements were from last year and we weren’t sure how accurate they were. This was also my first time drafting for a plus-sized person, the pattern instructions are formulated for smaller bodies so it was a little difficult but I trusted my previous pattern-cutting knowledge and knew that there would be a fitting to make any adjustments needed. I made a dress pattern and corset pattern from this block then sketched the decorative details.

– Attended a weekly staff meeting

-Was introduced to the Lyric office staff in the office by Natalie. Everyone was very friendly but meeting so many new people simultaneously was quite intimidating.