While the performers are front and center, a successful Broadway show requires collaboration among a team of artistic professionals, including the playwright and director. Designers are also critical in bringing a production to life, most notably creating the set, optimizing sound and lighting, and developing authentic and appealing costumes to enhance the overall viewing experience.
Costume design, in particular, is an important component of Broadway theater. Costume designers work with the director, along with the set and lighting design team, to ensure their creations align with the director’s intended tone and complement other visual elements. This is a demanding job that often requires extensive research, sketching ideas, sourcing materials, overseeing the construction of complex garments, and making fitting adjustments for each performer.
Below are six of the most iconic and successful Broadway costume designers of all-time.
Florence Klotz
A favorite of legendary director Hal Prince and composer Stephen Sondheim, Florence Klotz is tied with William Ivey Long for the all-time record of six Tony Awards for costume design in musicals. She won her first Tony for Follies (1972), which was her fourth time working with Prince. Ted Chapin, who worked on the show, said in his memoir Everything Was Possible that Klotz’s costume designs for Follies were so luxurious that they caused the show to go over its budget. Klotz also won costume design Tonys for A Little Night Music (1973), Pacific Overtures (1976), Grind (1985), Kiss of the Spider Woman: The Musical (1993), and Show Boat (1995), all of which were directed by Prince.
Klotz, who died in 2006, began her career on Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The King and I (1951), working as an assistant to Irene Sharaff. She first worked with Prince on A Call on Kuprin (1961) and also designed costumes for a pair of Sondheim revues: A Musical Tribute (1973) and Side by Side by Sondheim (1978). She won several other awards, including Drama Desk Awards for Outstanding Costume Design and the Irene Sharaff Lifetime Achievement Award.
William Ivey Long
A 76-year-old costume designer whose Broadway credits include productions such as Young Frankenstein, Cinderella, Hairspray, and On the Twentieth Century, William Ivey Long is a six-time Tony Award winner and has been nominated 18 times. He was nominated for Best Costume Design in a Musical for Diana: The Musical at the 75th Tony Awards in 2022 and nominated twice in 2019 for Beetlejuice and Tootsie. He last won in 2013 for Rodgers + Hammerstein’s Cinderella.
“Long’s creations have had a tendency to become as much of a celebrity as the people who wear them,” claimed art columnist Lauren Hodges in a review of Long’s work for Encore Magazine. “His pieces are so lively that they seem to have personalities on their own.”
Long has worked on more than 100 Broadway and off-Broadway productions and is a former chairman of The American Theatre Wing.
Gregg Barnes
Gregg Barnes won his third Tony Award for Best Costume Design in a Musical in 2023 for his work on Some Like It Hot, which is based on the 1959 comedy starring Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, and Jack Lemon. In an interview with Playbill after winning the award, Barnes admitted that he didn’t watch the classic film, set in the 1920s, before designing the costumes. He also spoke about his process, explaining he didn’t begin by researching the period but instead “tried to find the life” of the musical.
Barnes, an eight-time nominee in the Best Costume Design in a Musical category, also won for The Drowsy Chaperone (2006) and Follies (2012). He was nominated for Legally Blonde (2007), Kinky Boots (2013), Something Rotten! (2015), Tuck Everlasting (2016), and Mean Girls (2018).
Catherine Zuber
An eight-time Tony winner for Best Costume Design, Catherine Zuber has won five times for musicals and three times for plays. She has been nominated 15 times, the first of which she earned for Twelfth Night (1999). Zuber, who also designs costumes for opera, won her first Tony Award for Best Costume Design in a Musical for The Light in the Piazza (2005) and has since won for the musicals South Pacific (2008), The King and I (2015), My Fair Lady (2018), and Moulin Rouge! (2020). She won the Tony Award for Best Costume Design in a Play for Awake and Sing! (2006), The Cost of Utopia (2007), and The Royal Family (2010).
Susan Hilferty
Susan Hilferty is 0-for-3 in her recent Tony nominations for Best Costume Design, but she won the award in 2004 for her work on Wicked, which is still showing at the Gershwin Theatre and is the fourth-longest-running Broadway production of all time. Hilferty’s designs, including Elphaba’s black gown and Glinda’s sparkling “bubble dress,” have played a pivotal role in the success of the musical. She has designed costumes for more than 300 productions, including other Broadway shows like Into the Woods (2002) and Parade (2023).