Costumes Archives | Miami City Ballet

MCB Shares the Art of Costume Creation

Last Friday Miami City Ballet headed to NSU’s Museum of Art Fort Lauderdale to spend some time with students at the Auto Nation Academy of Art + Design Creative Summer Art Academy.

MCB’s Costume Designer & Director Haydee Morales, along with Costume Artist Maria Morales took a group of 60 students on a creative journey through costume and wardrobe design -from how long takes to create wardrobe for a ballet, to where they get their materials—even noting the Wardrobe team’s frequent trips to New York City since supplies can be hard to find locally.

A trip to the costume shop for Don Quixote!

The lavish, detailed costumes of Don Quixote are one of this classic ballet’s distinguishing factors. The ballet is filled with a variety of costumes including a traditional matador’s “suit of lights,” named for its rhinestones, beads and gold or silver thread, and his swirling capes to fight off the bulls. What makes these costumes so unique is that they evoke the culture and feeling of Spain — where Marius Petipa danced as an impoverished young man. For #TutuTuesday, we are taking a look at the beautiful tutus in Don Quixote that reflect the utmost elegance of a prima ballerina, but embrace the passion and flair that characterizes the rich, culture of Spain.

From Paper and Pencil to Costume

When Liam Scarlett — the young, acclaimed choreographer from London’s The Royal Ballet — brought our Costume Designer and Wardrobe Director Haydée Morales his costume design sketches for his new work Euphotic, she knew that she was up to the challenge!

The first step in bringing Scarlett’s vision to life was helping him determine the full color palette and types of fabrics that were aesthetically appealing, yet allowed the dancers to move freely. Scarlett wanted the costume hues to include dark blue for the corps dancers, radiant yellow for the principals, and a combination of yellow and blue for the soloists to tie the piece together. He also wanted the costumes to depict the ombré effect, which shows the consistent gradient of a color from its lightest shade to its darkest.

Becoming Mother Commedia

Mother Commedia has big shoes to fill! With a skirt weighing 50 POUNDS that houses 8 polichinelles underneath, creating this character is quite a production. Find out some of the backstage secrets about becoming Mother Commedia in this video. Or, watch Mother Commedia perform LIVE during Miami City Ballet’ s classic production of George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker™.

Dressing Viscera

Liam Scarlett not only choreographed Viscera, but he also designed the costumes for the World Premiere! Haydee Morales, MCB’s Costume Designer and Director, worked closely with Liam to bring his vision to the stage.

Haydee had a chat with us about Liam and the Viscera costumes.

Brand new ballet – brand new costumes!

As opening night rapidly approaches, the wardrobe department has been hard at work for months. This week, we visited the shop while they were working on the costumes for the company premiere of Fanfare. As many companies often do, MCB sometimes rents costumes from other companies, but not in the case of Fanfare! The wardrobe ladies are making them from start to finish.

We snapped a few shots during our visit. Although we tried our very best to capture the magic, these photos do not do the amazing costumes justice. Don’t miss them onstage when Program I opens on October 15 at Adrienne Arsht Center, November 12 at Broward Center and November 19 at Kravis Center.

the piccolo

peg crowns in the making

crown patterns

french horn pattern

creating tutus

This harp was hand stitched!

the harp

Getting Ready for Ballroom – Part 4

Your last chance to see The Neighborhood Ballroom before the dancers get back into tutus and pointe shoes is this weekend at Kravis Center. You’ve already seen the costume bibles, the costumes for the first two acts of the ballet, and “THE FOX-TROT” costumes. Now, in the final installment of our series, Haydee shows us the hot costumes for “THE MAMBO” and gives us some background on how she found them!

Getting Ready for Ballroom – Part 3

After seeing the costume bibles and costumes for the first two acts of The Neighborhood Ballroom, we are sure you’ve noticed that the attire changes with each era. In this installment of the series, Haydee shows us the costumes for “THE FOX-TROT” and some of the accessories the women wear. It is incredible the amount of details that go into all the dresses!

Don’t miss The Neighborhood Ballroom this weekend at Broward Center for the Performing Arts.

Getting Ready for Ballroom – Part 2

Now that you’ve seen the costume bibles, take a look at the costumes the dancers will be wearing on stage during The Neighborhood Ballroom! Haydee actually went to the vintage shops of Miami and found amazing attire for the ballet. But not all the pieces were purchased – some were made by the wardrobe department. See if you can tell the difference.

In this installment of the costume series, Haydee shows us what the dancers will be wearing in the first two acts of the ballet.

Getting Ready for Ballroom

This weekend, the dancers will hang up their tutus and tights and suit up in dresses and jackets — The Neighborhood Ballroom opens Friday night at Adrienne Arsht Center! Haydee Morales, MCB Costume Designer and Director of Wardrobe, designed the costumes for this full evening ballet. It took lots of hard work and long hours, but with the help of her team, Haydee created an entire wardrobe for this piece.

Here’s a sneak peek at what went into designing the costumes for The Neighborhood Ballroom.

Stay tuned for more of our costume series.