The Greatest Showman on Earth
Iridescent Liberty Lady

Description

"Liberty Horses: An act of, from one to twenty, horses working in a ring with no reins "
It was such an inspiring challenge to work on this project. After being presented with the initial mood boards for the costume concepts and seeing movie stills I was immediately attracted to the character of Zendaya and her pink pastel hair. I knew I had to work that into my work somehow. If you are familiar with my designs you know I love scales and feathers. I am fascinated by their shape and how you can almost sculpt with them. I love making scaled armor pieces that follow the curves of the body, flowing out in feathers like a mythical bird or dragon.
I usually pick metallic colors for this as they work best for the overall style of these dresses. But with the Haute Circus theme I started to toy with the idea of a scaled iridescent, pastel creature that was ‘born’ out of the spotlight. I imagined an act, a show, where she would appear and create her own world for the audience.
I have always loved acts with white and black horses and it wasn’t difficult to imagine she appearing in between a circle of staggering, horses with big plumes on their heads. From there the design almost grew organically.

I used iridescent and silver mirror scales to reflect as much light as possible, so she would ‘glow’ in the spotlight.

Each scale on her armor was cut by hand and laminated. I used the big iridescent sequins from the skirt fabric to mix the top and the bottom together so it became a whole.
To give the idea that this was a creature rising up from the spotlight I added plumes, which look a bit like mist so when the model walked, it almost looked like she was floating on air.

Amazing photographer: Josefien Hoekstra
inspiring model: Tinotenda Mushore