Costume database of the Royal Danish Theatre open to the public

[Anne]

The Royal Dansih Theatre has just opened to the public a highly interesting database with pictures of costumes used for ballets, operas and dramas performed at the theatre during the last three centuries: Costume database.

The pictures are of an astonishing high quality. You can almost see every stitch in the costume, some of them made with an exquisite craftmanship and with lots of details, which you might not be able to see from a distance but which adds to the depth of the visual texture.  The tailors of the Royal Theatre are famous for their craftmanship and creative power. Because of the many modern stagings the demand for handtailored costumes is rapidly declining as ready-to-wear clothes are taking over, and the tailors department has therefor been through some severe cut backs recently. The ballet, however, is still highly dependent on the specialized knowledge of the tailors, who know exactly which needs a ballet costume must cover.

I browsed through the database and had many lovely rendez-vous's with costumes I remember from various stagings. A lovely detail is that many of the costums is made for a certain dancer, and you can see the label of the dancer sewn into the costume. There are costumes worn by dancers like Erik Bruhn, Kirsten Simone, Frank Schaufuss and Henning Kronstam, but I was particularly fond of seeing a costume from La Ventana worn by my childhood  ballet teacher Ruth Andersen: La Ventana Spanish dance

Happy browsing!

Edited January 14, 2021 by Anne

[Helene]

Wow, what an awesome resource!  Thank you so much for posting, Anne .