Designs by Tyler

{ Contact me for Services! } Costume Design + Seamstress Alterations + Laundry Services [email protected]

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Show: Radium Girls

As Performed By: Indiana Wesleyan University Theater Guild

Venue: RCA Blackbox Theater

Date: April 2014

Notes: Our costume shop coordinator, Kandra Johnson, was the costume designer for this show. It was the first show she had ever costumed, and it came as quite the curveball to her. It is a very complex show to costume with 45 characters written to be played by ten actors, the sheer quantity of costumes is intimidating in it of itself, but then orchestrating the changes that went along with that many costumes was overwhelming to the first-time costumer. At IWU, costumes are “due” for a costume parade the Monday of tech week. On Thursday the week before tech Kandra had not yet begun to pull from the shop to fit her actors. She hadn’t started sewing the six gray dresses upon which all of her female costumes were to be built off of. She hadn’t gotten measurements or read the script, only had a little bit of a direction she wanted to go based in what she had heard the other designers discuss at production meetings. The enormity of the project had scared her into inaction.

I was able to sympathize with her and take her step by step what she needed to get done. I asked specific questions with background, for example I asked her “What would you like Berry to wear? He’s the lawyer defending Grace against Roeder. Keffer plays him,” and she was then able to pull and make some decisions from what we had in the shop. We did this for each character.

I made the six dresses, then a few ties and other accessories to differentiate between different male characters played by the same actor. I then attended a few rehearsals and marked out entrances and exits and choreographed the 67 fast changes, 48 of which were assisted, 42 of which were assisted by me personally. The changes themselves weren’t difficult, but the nature of our space and design of our set left me with very little space to assist actors with changes which made doing so quickly and traveling between entrance and exit places challenging. 

All Photography Credit to Rachel Stuckey

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Show: The Tender Land

As Performed By: Indiana Wesleyan University Theater Guild

Venue: Phillippe Auditorium

Date: March 2014

Notes: The production process for The Tender Land overlapped the production process for No Exit by about two weeks. Fortunately, this showwas fairly easy to costume in comparison to the other shows I had been given the privilege of working with. Set in the dust bowl, the costume pieces I employed were fairly easy to find and consisted of a variety of muted colors in light, “dusty” fabrics. The common vision of the designers, particularly lighting, was that we didn’t want for the production to be simple varying shades of beige—we wanted the show to be alive with color to reflect the beauty the characters saw in the land. But we also didn’t want it to be outlandish; we wanted to stay true to the story. I was able to, with the help of the design team, find a happy medium. Major sewing projects included Laurie’s party dress (which was a pivotal part of the storyline) and the dance costumes, along with a few skirts and aprons here and there and some minor alterations. Though there were a few assisted changes, because the show was produced through the music department and therefore was double cast (which also meant double the costumes), the actors assisted their counterparts on their off nights, which removed the responsibility from me.

All Photography Credit to Rachel Stuckey

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Show: No Exit

As Performed By: Indiana Wesleyan University Theater Guild

Venue: RCA Blackbox Theater

Date: February 2014

Notes: When I initially sat down with my director for this show, he was envisioning a show in which the three characters (set in hell) were made ‘timeless’ by each being dresses from a different time period. The more I read the script and sat in on rehearsals, however, the more I felt this direction didn’t fit with where the action of the play was going. It was in one of our later production meetings that Dr.Wood, the director, was discussing how our pantomimist bellhop of hell would be in clown during pre-show (to add to the absurdist environment of the play) that I schemed the idea of casting our characters as circus performers. I put together a few costume morgues with this idea in mind then approached Dr.Wood, who consented to my idea. The cast was very excited by it and used the circus theme in their character work, and even in their blocking. I had maintained a good relationship with a costumer in Columbus, Ohio that I rented several jackets from, and built Estelle’s tight-rope walker tu-tu. The bellhop jacket I found was around four sizes too small, but I was able to deconstruct it and make it large enough for our actor.

All Photography Credit to Rachel Stuckey

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[alextylerdesigns]

Show: The Crucible

As Performed By : Indiana Wesleyan University Theater Guild

Venue: RCA Blackbox Theater

Date: October 2013

Notes:The largest challenge with this show was definitely the enormity of the sewing projects. After the read through and several meetings with the other designers I decided that, in order to achieve the look I was going for, I was going to have to build all of the ladies’ dresses from scratch (as our costume shop had no contacts or leads of anywhere to rent from). This would not have been a challenge if I had a crew that could sew or a crew at all. However no such crew was set in place, and I had no connections in this new program, so I found myself making all ten dresses with no dress form and a sewing machine I really had to nurse to get it to work. I built a few of the gentlemen’s costumes as well, then added embellishments to some wool coats I found at  a thrift store that serves as the coats for the men of the court.

Indiana Wesleyan invites a representative from the American College Theater Festival (ACTF) to review one show every season. It was for The Crucible that I received the ACTF honor of merit in costume design. Considering that the only other award given to IWU from ACTF within the past ten years was for a set design executed by our shop director three years prior, I was exceptionally honored. I was also awarded the “Wesley” for “Best Costume Design” for my costume design for this show (Indiana Wesleyan’s version of an Oscar) which is granted by popular vote conducted by professors in various departments of the university. 

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Show: Singin' in the Rain

As Performed By: Orangelight Productions

Venue: Olentangy Orange High School Auditorium

Date: April 2012

Notes:  

Because the costumes for this production were very time period specific (with roaring ‘20s glitz and glamour), we rented or purchased many of the costumes for this production. Major sewing projects included around sixteen chorus dresses, around thirty custom bow ties, and alterations to rented costumes. What made this show especially difficult for us, however, was that it was the musical demanded many complicated fast changes during the run of the show. The two main characters, Cosmo Brown and Don Lockwood, by the request of our director, had to change between every scene. And, because our program favored if not required traditional dress, each of their costumes had a minimum of five pieces. Add in the fact that they swapped their dress shoes for taps now and again and we had quite a challenge. Fortunately, my strengths in costuming are in organization and fast changes. I made a list of all of the fast changes in the show with the grand total being 83 (including the chorus changes that were facilitated by our crew). I included page numbers, the last line on stage before the change and the first line after they return to the stage, and an approximate time limit for each change. 

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Show: The Wizard of Oz

As Performed By: Orangelight Productions

Venue: Olentangy Orange High School Auditorium

Date: April, 2011

Notes: The Wizard of Oz was announced as our spring musical my sophomore year and I was instantly excited. Our department found it best to divide the show between two costumers, designating each costumer with a few scenes and co-costuming others. For this production, I was in charge of costuming the munchkins. This show for me was the first with paper renderings to supplement my project planning. Thematic aspects of my munchkin design were bold colors and geometric shapes. Direction for these costumes included brightly colored full skirts, plaid shirts, bows, big buttons, and the like. The other costumer and I worked together on the other costumes such as the monkey guard costumes, the jitter-bug dance ensemble, and, of course, our four leads: Dorothy, Tin Man, Cowardly Lion, and Scarecrow. We rented the lion costume and Tin Man costume, but made the scarecrow costume and Dorothy’s dress ourselves. The most structurally difficult and creative costume was for the trees in the haunted forest, where we attached branches to belts to be held by our actors and covered them with brown dresses and draped fabric. We were lucky that fast changes in this show were minimal because, even after staying in the workshop past eleven o’clock eight days in a row during tech week, we were still fixing and adding to costumes the day of opening night. Our time management and team work got better over the years by us recognizing and pursuing a system of organization for our projects, which we would implement the following year working together.

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Show: The Sound of Music

As Performed By: Orangelight Productions

Venue: Olentangy Orange High School Auditorium

Date: Spring 2010

Notes: Three years after our production of “the Sound of Music,” Cathy Swain-Abrams and I decided to equate my role as costume designer to “being thrown in the ocean to be taught how to swim.” It was my first project of this size and Swain-Abrams’ first musical as a director. Needless to say there were many mistakes that had me drowning in last minute, less-than-well-crafted work, but it was an excellent learning experience. Large sewing projects included the “curtain” costumes for the seven children, several dresses, and the added pieces for the Nazi uniforms. Swain-Abrams wanted all seven children to match for every scene, so for a design strategy I found plain white cotton dresses for each of the girls and polos and shorts for each of the boys, then made easily attached accessories (trims for the dresses, ascots, caplet overlays, etc) for each scene. As for the run of the show, our most difficult change was for our leading lady, Maria, who changed from her black, jersey knit postulant dress to a brightly colored traveling dress that buttoned down the front. The change itself was simple, but it needed to be completed in less than 20 seconds. With four hands (one of which was a sound crew member who checked the batteries on her mic pack) we had her back on stage at 17.1 seconds. The second most difficult change was difficult due to lack of practice; at the end of Thursday night’s show, one of our supporting characters, Uncle Max, injured his back and was unable to perform on Friday night. Luckily his understudy was well prepared for everything in the show, with the exception of his fast change. This had me running back and forth between the stage and wardrobe room during the performance. Other fast changes in the show were difficult because they were mass changes of all seven kids or the whole cast, which was managed with the addition of a few stage hands and some practice, aided with YouTube tutorials on tips and tricks to fast changes.

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Show: Dracula

As Performed By: Orangelight Productions

Venue: Olentangy Orange High School Auditorium

Date: Fall 2009

Notes: The most difficult part of costuming this production should have been the research and replication of high class British 1840s fashion, but for my crew and I it was the dreaded, iconic Dracula cape. Made of slippery costume silk by never-touched-a-sewing-machine-before-in-my-life hands, the two capes (one lined with red silk and the other with a plaster mold underneath for a special effect) took a total of thirteen hours. The rest of the costumes, with exception of minor alterations, required no sewing. Most of our casual wear for all of our productions was found by searching thrift stores in the Columbus, Delaware, and Marion Ohio area; many of which, through agreements organized by my director and I, loaned costume pieces to us free of charge. A few dresses and several men’s suits were rented from Otterbein University’s costume department.

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Alex Tyler

A small collection of my works and services as a seamstress, costume designer, and alterations specialist. For information on pricing and services, email me at [email protected].