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Aoife O’Callaghan 

BA [Hons] Design for Stage + Screen Costume Design

Aoife O’Callaghan is a costume designer and maker. She started sewing at age 14 and her interest in making clothing inspired her to come study in IADT’s Design for Stage and Screen Course. She enjoys bringing characters to life through costume and working with different fabrics to create interesting shapes and textures. For her major project she decided to design for the film “The Red Shoes” (1948).

Victoria's final costume for the ballet sequence. As she travels through the journey of the ballet I wanted Victoria to stand out amongst every setting. I designed this ivory chiffon dress with that in mind.
It was important for me to make a dress that was appropriate for movement. made from a lightweight chiffon, the sleeves were adapted to not limit the movement of the arms and the skirt was made up of three circle skirts.
I wanted there to be a form of transformation when Vicky puts on the red shoes reflected in her costume. I designed an underskirt with a gradient of red to represent the curse of the red shoes bleeding up through her as if she is being engulfed by the power.
The frills of the skirt were created through smocking various red fabrics and attaching them to the red skirt which I had dyed to have a gradient of red
Video showing the dress in movement
Sketches for Victoria's rehearsal wear. I took inspiration from 60's ballet rehearsal wear for the simple forms and shapes. The light colour palette hints at Victoria's youth and hope.
Sketches for Ivana's rehearsal wear. I wanted Ivana's costume to be in total contrast to Vicky's rehearsal wear. Her costume had to be dramatic and glamorous, matching her personality
For the funfair sequence I wanted the characters to have an overwhelming feeling about them so that they look fantastical and mystical to stand out amongst the darkness.
Within the funfair sequence Vicky gets lost in the night, transfixed by the events and dances the night away. She would stand out amongst the pop colours and darkness in her ivory dress.
When Vicky reamerges in the village she comes across monsters lurking around by the street lamps of the night. I began to wonder how I could go about creating creatures that would lurk under the light of night and I took inspiration from moths as they have interesting shapes and colours. It gave me the opportunity to crest costumes with dappled tones and textures as well as creating a large surface area of the wings which would translate beautifully to dance.
The Shoemakers colour palette in the ballet is reminiscent of Boris Lermentov’s clothing, hinting at their similarities. Like Lermentov the materials used in his costume would be luxurious and formal such as a brocade or a patterned wool for his jacket, but his clothing would not inhibit his dancing abilities. The deep and saturated colours would stand out among the pale palette of the villagers
Sketches for the funeral scene in the ballet. I designed the mourners in a way that they were dressed in cold black and white tones, leaving Vicky’s ivory dress and the red underskirt as a saturated reminder of the journey she has been through and that stands out amongst the crowd once again.
The Red Shoes

The Red Shoes follows the story of Victoria Page, a young, ambitious dancer who catches the attention of the head of an esteemed ballet company run by Boris Lermentov. He recruits Vicky to the company and gives her the chance to fufill her lifes ambition by becoming the lead dancer in the premiere of the company’s new ballet the Red Shoes, composed by a young and up in coming composer Julien Craster. However when Julien and Vicky fall in love she is forced to choose between her love and her passion for dance which puts her in an impossible situation. I focused on design for movement and took inspiration from the 1970's when designing this piece.


Thesis PDF

Space Age Fashion and the representation of women in 1960s Science Fiction film and television

This thesis explores the roots of how we perceive that women of the future will be dressed came to be. I explore the history of futuristic fashion design by looking at the Space Age Fashion trend of the 1960s and the precursors to the movement. Within this movement I look beyond the visual attributes of the clothing but also at how this aesthetic looked at the roles women were set to play in a futuristic society. From there I explored how this influenced science fiction design of women of the 1960’s in television and film, using the examples of Star Trek:The Original Series (1966-9), Barbarella (1968) and 2001 A Space Odyssey (1968) .


Thesis PDF
Costume Design
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