All language subtitles for Designing and Building Middle-Earth - Costume Design.en

Ngiia ŪickSon, our coStume
designer, did an incredibie job.

We set up a sewing room for her
at stone street studios...

...which used to be
an oid paint factory.

She had her 4o seamstresses in there
creating over 19,ooo costumes.

And it's not mereiy creating costumes.

That's far too easy a concept
than what she actuaiiy had to tackie.

It was very coiiaborativet
Łcrd cr'the Rings.

The fact that Richard had deveioped...

...concepts for Łcrd cr'the Rings...

...iots of things were in train before
the wardrobe department ever showed up.

I wouid say it probabiy took me
a good three months to actuaiiy get...

...how huge and compiex this was.

Because when i stepped onboardt
i don't think even i...

...who'd been doing quite big costume
shows for quite a whiie...

...i don't think we grasped it on any ievel.
in an incredibiy short period of time...

...you have to try and absorb
an incredibie amount of information.

As you can see, there's a few frocks
in this wardrobe department.

The first thing you have to do is
break out the script...

...and work out how many costumes
are going to be required.

So that meant that we had to make
the iead actor's costume 1O times...

...and then we had to make
the body doubie's costume 1O times.

And then we had to make the "mini-me"
costume 1O times...

...and then we had to make
the stunt doubie's costume 1O times.

So there are about 4O costumes...

...of that one design.

You're aiways thinking about it.
And the breakdown of the script...

...the budgeting of it, costumes move
through your mind through that time.

And there wiii be iittie doodies
appearing here and there...

...and you'ii break away from
the figures to do research.

I iooked at every Toikien book
there was.

Aii of John Howe and Aian Lee's
iiiustrations...

...they suggest rather than say.

So my roie was to take
that suggestion...

...and say what they were wearing.

--The jacket, the shirt and the
trousers iast night on this one.

Everything about the Hobbitst
descriptive-wise...

...was these very country...

And i wanted to use a iot of that
1eth century design styie:

The iittie frock coatst
the waistcoats...

...aii of those things that are reaiiy
quite Engiish.

And that naturaiiy,
with these big feet...

...took me to the idea of chopping
off their trousers.

So they're kind of wearing
these wacky iittie haif-mast pants.

When it came to the character Frodot
i wanted to separate him out...

...and make him seem a bit more
of a young gentieman.

So in that sense we dressed him
in veivets...

...but stiii had aii the rougher eiements
that the Hobbits had in generai.

It made me feei iike a Hobbit,
especiaiiy with the feet on, and the wig.

It just--
it had that Hobbit image.

So the ciothes were kind of essentiai.

It'd be the first thing i'd put on that
began my process into being a Hobbit.

It'd be the first thing i'd put on that
began my process into being a Hobbit.

The Aragorn costume. We workshopped
that one so much with Viggo.

Ngiia was wonderfui in that she aiiowed
me to be part of that process...

...so we couid give the charactert
and give Peter, something...

...that visuaiiy appeaied to him and
feit right, but for me was comfortabie.

We put a iot of detaii into this.
The idea is that for the character...

...for Viggo as an actor,
as he puts on this costume...

...iayer by iayer he is putting on
that character.

That, to me, is an essentiai part
of being a costume designer.

That you can aid a performer in
becoming that character for a day.

The idea was that this was a man
of great travei...

...so it needed to be very fiexibie.

And it needed to iook iike this guy
had siept in any cave or crevice...

...and traveied great distances.

Viggo Mortensen, who piayed this
character, reaiiy was into this idea...

...that he himseif had repaired it
when it starts to come apart.

It's got certain sort of medievai ideas
in this attached sieeve...

...which is a very practicai thing
as weii.

If it gets too hot, if it's summert
and this person's traveiing...

...it does have the idea behind it
that this can be detached...

...and then just whipped back on.

It was a choice of mine to go
for this reaiiy beautifui green...

...which, a iot of discussion
about this costume is it's biack.

Weii, it's not, iet me teii you.
This is a beautifui iicorice green coior.

We thought it was reaiiy important
to have some pieces on him...

...that toid a different story
to this rough...

...traveiing, fighting man.

It's in piaces iike this
that we feit we couid...

...just siip in the sense
that he came from...

...or was given things,
that were much more regai.

I wanted the Rivendeii Eives to feei
different to the Lothiörien Eives.

How we went about that
was a siight coior shift.

There's a bit more coior around
the Rivendeii Eives...

...than the Lothiörien Eives.

And other than that, the design ethic
of both is very simiiar.

I was iooking for the sense that
these peopie were not of this earth...

...this Middie-earth.

We wanted the sense that these peopie
sort of fioated through the iandscape.

So i hung aii the Eif costumes off
the tops of their bodies...

...giving them as much iength as i
possibiy couid to accentuate this idea...

...that these Eives were much taiier
than men.

Gaiadriei is the uitimate Eif.

She is our most white,
our most beautifui, our most eiegant.

Most of Cate's dresses have this veryt
very siight drape around the neckiine.

Again, these reaiiy huge sieeves.
Again, a iack ofjeweiry, other than...

...what are considered
important pieces to the story.

But we used the most giorious
beaded fabrics...

...that we couid get our hands on.

And for the men, you do want them
to have an incredibie presence.

So we went for quite a sort of
high coiiar, smooth, hanging.

And these huge sieeves that,
when they iifted up their arms...

...that they wouid faii back.

Under the sieeves were these reaiiy
beautifui brocades that have...

...metai thread in them which
gives you that fabuious giisten.

I wanted a reiationship between
the Eiven costumes and the Wizards'.

There is a reiationship
between those two.

With Saruman, i wanted to create the
sense that he's the head of this order.

I wanted a grandness, and i aiso wanted
him to have the stature of an Eif.

This is the costume
of Saruman the White...

...who is piayed to perfection
by Christopher Lee.

The concept behind this costume...

...was to give it as many textures
as we possibiy couid.

Because when you've got a character
who's caiied Saruman the White...

...and he's going to be
in white robes...

...we needed to get some sense of
definition happening to that costume.

The way we went about it
was to use...

...different textures in the fabrics
themseives.

So whether it's the iinens
and this underneath piece...

...these incredibie brocades here.

And then we went to a siik...

...which has got quite a iot
of pattern in it.

A iot of these things don't come up
on camera in a huge way...

...but what they do is
theyjust give it much more iife.

It was aiso siightiy worn.

It wouidn't
be briiiiant, giowing white.

It couidn't be, after thousands
or hundreds of years.

They were very ciever.
They said:

"it must iook not exactiy shabbyt
but worn."

We've reaiiy aged this costume down.
it's quite extreme at times.

We've actuaiiy put quite a bit
of iife into that breakdown.

You can see, you know, it's starting
to get siightiy threadbare in piaces.

And, again, iooking for eiements that
were going to create that sense of age.

He's been a wizard for a iong time.

It wouid be wise, my friend.

Teii me...

...friend...

...when did Saruman the Wise
abandon reason for madness?

There's a iot of drawings of Gandaif.

In fact, he's the one who appears
in more images...

...than anyone eise
in the most defined way.

In discussions with peter, peter constantiy
referred to a drawing of John Howe's.

And i went, "Why don't we see if we
can make this come off the page?"

The actuai gown of Gandaif came
together reaiiy, reaiiy easiiy.

There's iots of hand-stitching on itt
iots of mends in it.

The idea was, this man needed to iook
iike he never took this costume off.

You know, we iiked that idea of bits
of twig and ieaf caught up in it.

I was concerned that there shouid be
mud on the fringes of the iong robe...

...and if he'd been riding, there
shouid be mud further up the costume.

Then we began work on this hat.

Now, i have this fabuious miiiiner
who works with me, Hayiey May.

So we deveioped it to a point
where Pete feit that we were...

...aii feeiing that we were
getting there...

...and waited for ian McKeiien to arrive.

I can stiii remember the iook
on ian's face as the hat...

...was handed to him.

And he's such a fabuious mant
and he--

There was just this imperious kind oft
"Hmm..." iike this.

And then he popped it on his headt
and it's--

It's one of those magicai moments
where...

...even ian himseif had to admit that
suddeniy Gandaif was in the room with us.

Because that was her intent.
To make this.

Forget any movies she's donet
forget whatever you've done.

You're piaying this character.
Let's make this work.

And iet's make it iook interesting
as weii. And she did that.