Directed by Professor Anjalee Deshpande Hutchinson
Costume design by Paula D. Davis
Assistant Costume Design by Sydney de Briel
For this adaptation of the Jane Austen novel by Jon Jory, we were interested in the textures found in paper and watercolors. The scene designer and I had recently seen the film, Miss Potter, and we were very inspired by the beautiful renditions of Beatrix Potter’s creative process in her beautiful watercolors for her books. I wanted to explore dainty prints for the early 18th century empire gowns instead of the solids unusually seen. Unfortunately, the quality of the cotton prints of that period don’t really exist and so I chose to work in silks instead, which, were actually much more like the fine cottons of the era. As this was a large show and I had already decided to build all the daughters’ dresses we were able to rent the menswear and some of the extra womenswear. We did build lovely period over gowns for the older women characters as well. The build of the dresses was fun, as I had a whole group of students who had just taken costume craft so each of them got to be cutter/draper for one gown. My assistant, Sydney, made some fabulous hats that really topped the design off.
Link to PDF of costume research slides.
