initial thoughts: the tempest of lyme

hello!!!

It has been a while... but I thought I would write about my recent project that I am working on.

I am currently designing the costumes for a production of THE TEMPEST OF LYME. The script is "The Tempest" by William Shakespeare mixed with the backstory of how the tempest came about. I think the script is really clever as it breaks up the Shakespearean language with injections of "backstory" which makes it much more watchable and entertaining, whilst keeping the traditional Shakespeare story line. The production is being shown by the Marine Theatre in Lyme Regis, and it will be performed there. I thought it would be nice to share the design process with you and how it all comes to life.

So far I have read the script, analysed it, done initial mood boards,research and a colour chart. I will explain the process as I go along...

The first thing I did was analyse the script and do initial research. The research looked at: the background of the story and the historical context. I looked at the dress of the period in a lot of detail as that really paints the picture in my head of what it would have looked like in that time. From there I can develop and change things accordingly.

Because this play has around 50 characters from 3 different areas I thought it would be important to have a limited colour palette. This would bring in all the characters to be part of one production. It was still important to show the differences between the 3 groups though so this is what I came up with. The colours I will mainly use are: RED, GREEN AND BLUE. However I will use different shades for each group. For the Royalty characters (these are written by Shakespeare and are the Royals who get stranded on the island) , I will use the deeper shades such as; emerald green, royal and navy blue, scarlet and deep red. This will show their status and will be slightly more "dressed up". For the Island characters (these are more magical, also written by Shakespeare but they live on the Island), I will use more tropical shades, like bright green and turquoise. There are meant to look very fun magical and colorful. Then for the backstory characters (they are on the voyage from England, and are made up of merchants, sailors and servants), I will use dreary colours. Red brown, blue greys, olive greens. They are the servants and more "common" folk therefore need to be dressed much more practically.

The next step was to start looking at shapes, and inspirations. I mainly use pinterest, mixed with my historical costume book. I like to get inspiration from fashion, film, history and other costumes. I made a mood board for each group of characters, to give an idea of shapes, textures and concepts. For example here is the one for the Island group: