Last week I met after school with Ms. Turner, who has been the costume designer for all of AISL's previous performances. I showed her my rough sketches for the pieces (shown below) and later, we went through all of the school's fabric/clothing to pick through things that could possibly be used in Canterbury Tales. We brought out a lot of earth toned fabrics and items of clothing for the majority of the cast, and also some blues and reds for the wealthy characters. I took out some silks and furs for characters such as the Wife of Bath. Many of the things we pulled out could be used as inspiration for a costume that the tailor would make for us. Overall, I think this meeting was very productive and I got a lot of insight and resources on things to make/use for this play. Ms. Turner is going to be a big help in this production, if anything, I'm the help for her! Next I need to go fabric shopping and finalize the costumes for each and every character, as I now only have sketches for the main characters. Last Wednesday, I had a Whatsapp conversation with a tailor I know from last years prom, who seems quite reliable and reasonably priced. The conversation went well as he said he could do the tailoring for a play my school was putting on and I told him that I would call him when we could arrange a meeting with him the following week. I just contacted him now and asked if he could come to school on Wednesday (that's when there's an all-call rehearsal) so that we can discuss prices and he can take measurements of all the actors, and he said he could come to school at 14:30hrs! I have a list of questions I need to ask him if he's able to meet on Wednesday. They are as follows:
- Will you be willing to work at the American school for making the costumes, or would you prefer working at home/office?
- How much time are you willing to put in to making the costumes?
- What are your prices?
- How fast can you make these costumes and are they efficient? (Comfortable, easy to move in, not extremely well crafted- just so they can last for a few weeks)
- What kind of fabric do you have in your shop, and what kind of fabric do we need to buy elsewhere?
- Do you have your own supplies (sewing machine, thread, etc.)
- Can you take measurements of the actors here?