Treasure Island

During this production, I worked as part of the running wardrobe team as a dresser. It was performed at the Lighthouse Theatre in Poole.

This involved dressing the main cast of 16 actors, along with 7 crew members also requiring two costumes each when moving the set on stage during the performance. The costumes included complex 18th-century garments and corsets.

I carried out running repairs and alterations on the costumes. Because of the physicality of the set and the fight scenes, the costumes often required maintenance, such as rehemming skirts, sewing buttons (especially on cuffs), resoling shoes, and fixing trim.

I also laundered and washed the costumes. This included the fast laundering and stain removal of a white shirt covered with stage blood. As there were no duplicates for this and it was required in multiple performances, it needed to remain as white as possible; this required a lot of scrubbing!

I also performed character quick changes. I was assigned to multiple characters, including Squire Trelawney and Grandma/ Captain Flint (The Parrot), and Doctor Livesey, all of whom had multiple quick changes within the production. Doctor Livesey was particularly challenging as I had less than 40 seconds to put her into a gown, hat, and multiple jewellery pieces.