Intricate Costume Designs Bring Us Backstage On Broadway

Most of us take a long time to identify our “calling.”

Building a career, after all, is no easy task, and the vast majority of us need to invest lots of trial and error into the process to figure out what, exactly, makes us tick.

Jess Goldstein, Tony Award–winning costume designer and aesthetic marvel, is no exception. Much like Chazz Levi describing her start as a florist, Goldstein didn’t anticipate the direction he would move in.

When he explains his entrance into the world of theater, he describes an early love affair with Broadway and an eye for all the high-style details of the stage, but notes, “I never had any dreams of becoming a costume designer.”

Ultimately, however, the vocation found him. In a career spanning 30 years, Goldstein has made his mark again and again in the dramatic, fast-paced world of Broadway theater.

He has designed for big-budget musicals like Jersey Boys, and for quiet, cerebral shows like Proof. In 2005, he even took home a Tony Award for his work on The Rivals.

Now, in 2016, he has turned his eye (and his pencils) to the task of showing us how his design process works in the latest installment of Little Things’ exclusive series Masters Of Craft.

From Gilbert and Sullivan’s swashbuckling comic opera The Pirates of Penzance to the kicky, nautical On The Town, check out the video below to see Goldstein explain the inspiration and method behind some of his most storied designs.

And if you were instantly swept up in his picture of the glittering world of theater, make sure to SHARE this video with friends and family!