April 2021: L'incoronazione di Poppea (period remake)

Costume design for the opera L'incoronazione di Poppea by Claudeo Monteverdi. 1910 remake.

This project was part of my studies at Edinburgh College of Art. The assignment was to remake our earlier designs for the opera into a period piece for a given date, as well as produce a half scale version of the costume using a given fabric, a full scale hat, and a project book detailing our research and development for the project. I was given the year 1910 and a polyester taffeta.

A line drawing of the characters of Poppe and Nerone. Poppea is wearing a red, floorlength dress with narrow pleats and a black belt, and a red opera coat with black marbled surface design. She wears a red turban over afro-style hair. Nerone has a black and red striped dress shirt with a red bib front and a high collar. His bowtie is undone and he is wearing a black smoking jacket with red marble surface design. He has a fez, black shoes but no trousers, with one of his red socks is sliding down.

This iteration of the project focuses on the era as one where ideas of status, taste and class are in flux, playing with the upper class European preoccupation with orientalism while retaining and developing on some aspects of the original project. I was particularly interested in the eras relationship to the modern woman and her body. After an era of increasingly controlled and disciplined bodies, multiple trends arose which rejected a form that demanded highly structured undergarments. The reformkleiden movement focused on looser textiles which did not expose the body, Paul Poiret shifted the silhouette entirely, and Mariano Fortuny emphasized a more sensual and undressed body. The Fortuny delphos gown was a core inspiration for this project, along with men's smoking jackets (which often borrowed heavily from orientalism) and opera gowns.

A photo of a turban style hat modelled by a young woman with mid-length, dark brown hair in tight curls. She is facing three quarter forwards. The turban is a draped red organza with a plume of black rooster feathers at the front. A photo which is a back view of the above turban. From this angle you can see the organza twisting into a knot at the back and the black base fabric over which the organza is draped. A photo which is a side view of the above turban. From this angle you can better see the way the rooster feathers curve forwards and inwards.

Turban with rooster feathers modelled by Izzy Jones-Rigby.

A waist-up photo of a red taffeta dress on a body form. The dress is narrowly pleated to conform to the shape of the body form. The shoulders have black closing ties finished with gold beads. The same gold beads go along the sides of the dress to button it closed. The waist has a wide black sash with gold emu feathers, tied into a bow at the back. A full photo of the above dress, seen from the side and without the belt. This view shows the slight trail at the back of the dress, the black waist ties, and the full length row of golden bead closures along the side. A full photo of the above dress, seen from the side, but with an opera coat over it. The coat is made from the same fabric, only covered in black marble detailing. The sleeves are wide and go to about elbow length. The black collar stands up at the neck and continues down the front. At the knees, the coat flares out towards the floor where it spreads into a circle shape. The waist is tied with black tassles. A waist-up photo of the red taffeta dress and the opera coat. This angle shows the V-line of the front hem of the opera coat, and the glitter detail of the black fabric edge.

Half-scale pleated dress with bead closures along the sides and emu-feather belt. Water marbled opera coat with tassles and padded hem.
Below: detail of coat and pages from costume book featuring development of project.

A close up photo of the opera coat which shows the marble detail on its shoulder, the fabric of the collar, and the black lining. Two pages from the costume book collaged together. The back page is titled NERONE and features two photos of smoking ensembles as well as two pencil and ink sketches of a man wearing similar garments. The front page is titled POPPEA and shows several pencil and ink sketches of dresses in the style of the 1910s. There are also two photos of dresses: one layered pink dress with a low back and a train, and one peach coloured Delphos gown with a large kimono worn over it.