Costume Designers Reveal the Job Is Half Logistics

Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- IndieWire held a costume design panel for its Craft Roundtables moderated by Jim Hemphill, featuring five designers from Emmy-contending shows: Sarah Evelyn ("The Beauty"), Trayce Gigi Field ("Spider-Noir"), Rudy Mance ("Love Story"), Kathleen Felix-Hager ("Hacks" and "The Paper"), and Natasha Newman-Thomas ("Euphoria")
- Sarah Evelyn said costume designers have 'a big hand in the budget and the labor,' adding that 'your whole day can be taken up with logistics' and crediting herself for designing 'for 75 seconds' on a good day
- Trayce Gigi Field described the job as 'half organization and half creative,' arguing that designers must 'understand your budget and have the skills to go talk to a producer about money'
- Kathleen Felix-Hager was the only panelist representing two series, doubling up on HBO's "Hacks" and Peacock's "The Paper"
- The full panel is streaming on PBS SoCal, the PBS App, IndieWire.com, and IndieWire's social channels
Why it matters: Five working costume designers used a trade-platform stage to publicly quantify how much of their job is labor and budget coordination rather than design — a reframing that could matter for how producers staff the role, how the Television Academy sizes the craft category, and how up-and-coming designers price their own time.
Ask SkimNews




