To begin the costuming process, Beebe and her team began by researching the 1920s and pulling up fashion images from the decade. In her research, she found it was an especially dressy decade, thanks to a surging economy at the time. “That time period was much more formal than we dress today,” says Beebe, “Everyone was in a suit, jacket, and tie with a hat. The flapper girls were the partiers of the bunch.” Since much of the episodes thus far have taken place within the art deco Butterfly Club, she put emphasis on party wear and flapper dresses in particular. “We were very authentic with the silhouettes and the styles,” says Beebe, who dressed actors in boyish-cut shift dresses with beaded embroidery, often finished off with headpieces, hats, and gloves (more is more!). The men, meanwhile, wore the sharp suiting, overcoats, and fedoras that were popular during the era.
Beebe had to keep in mind that the 1920s town was in fact a theme park run by a corporation that would spare no cost when it came to verisimilitude. “We absolutely did not want it to look costume-y,” says Beebe. “Nothing looked brand-spanking new. We did go to the trouble of aging things down a little.” To give it that authentic look, she sourced many vintage 1920s pieces from various rental companies in L.A. “We brought back racks and racks of pieces,” she says. “We were pretty fortunate that there were quite a bit of 1920s to be found locally.”
Photo: John Johnson/HBO
