This morning, I released a new episode of the Sighs and Whispers podcast—a conversation with costume maker Sally Ann Parsons. Below is an introduction to Sally Ann—you can listen to our discussion on Soundcloud, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify.
I first learned of Sally Ann Parsons from Bobbi Owen, who I interviewed in 2023 about her exhibition The Wondrous Willa Kim: Costume Designs for Actors and Dancers at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Bobbi—a professor of costume history and design for over 40 years at UNC-Chapel Hill and author of nine books on theatrical designers—met Sally Ann through Willa Kim, a truly fantastic Korean-American costume designer primarily known for her dance and theatre work. As Bobbi explained to me, Sally Ann—as a costume maker with over 60 years of experience—has a different perspective on costumes than we do when we view them only from afar, on stage or in sketches. Her work is about breaking down sketches into material parts and then constructing them into reality. As she details in our conversation, the costume shop and its many workers are responsible for bringing a costume designer’s sketches to life. This might mean scheming how to construct a rigid form that can skate on ice, how to sew a medieval dress capable of high kicks or how to create a lion’s costume that can survive years of sweaty performances, then shopping and sourcing every single fabric, trim, dye or paint, before the actual production work begins.
Sally Ann Parsons is really the grande dame of Broadway and the dance and theatre worlds. Now in her 80s, she has been involved with the theatre since she was a small child—the daughter of a well-known character actor, Milton Parsons (who you would definitely recognize from his over 160 TV, movie, and commercial appearances), she made her stage debut at 9. Acting brought her to costumes and set design. In the 1970s, in addition to designing costumes for downtown dance troupes and ballets, she began working with stage costumer Ray Diffin and costume designer Willa Kim, before setting up her own costume workshop, Parson-Meares, in 1980 with her husband James Meares.
Daniel Nagrin in Sam Shepherd’s “Jacaranda” (1979) with costumes and set by Sally Ann Parsons:
Parson-Meares quickly became a Premier Broadway costume shop known for its excellence in artistic and fantastic costumes. Among the many Broadway hits for which she has supervised costume-making are “Hamilton,” “The Lion King,” “Aladdin,” “Wicked,” “Cats,” “Phantom of the Opera,” and “Starlight Express.” Additionally, they have created costumes for the Metropolitan Opera and other opera houses, numerous ballets, Disney on Ice, and the Rockettes. Sally was honored with the Theatre Development Funds’ Irene Sharaff Artisan Award in 2009, and in 2016, Sally Ann was the first costume maker to receive a Tony Honor.
From their website:
“In the thousands of designs Parsons-Meares has realized for theatre, dance, and film, each garment is ushered through its various stages of development with intense scrutiny and no small measure of judgement. Constant alteration and refinement mark its journey to completion. This high degree of refinement and scrutiny speaks of Parsons-Meares attention to detail and excellence. Precision beading, unique sculpted heads, intricate fabric painting techniques, and a bevy of talented and experienced operators, finishers, dyers and drapers all contribute to the finished design.”
Since the 1980s, costume shops have faced difficulties surviving in New York City’s theatre and garment districts. These difficulties were exacerbated by the pandemic, with the long closures of theatre, TV, and movie production imperiling the few remaining costume shops. As part of the Costume Industry Coalition, Sally Ann helped to raise money to give micro-grants to costume shops heavily in debt due to the closures.
This interview with Sally Ann took place at the Parson-Meares workshop in Long Island City in 2023 (they moved there from the Garment District earlier this century). The city’s largest costume shop, Parson-Meares, often employs over 60 dressmakers, craftspeople, and artists for work on a single project.
Sally Ann and I chat about her long history in the theatre and with costumes, all things costume construction, and about all of the wonderful costume designers and artisans she has collaborated with. This is a really fascinating conversation if you’ve ever wanted to step behind the scenes and learn more about the work that goes into the costumes that delight us.
San Francisco Ballet’s “The Tempest” (1980) with costume design by Willa Kim, made by Sally Ann Parsons:
The Parson-Meares workshop is a wonder of creativity and artistry, as you can see in some of the images below:
Brilliant work highlighting how costume makers translate artistic vision into physical realilty. The point about Sally Ann having a fundamentaly different perspective because she sees costumes from the inside out, not just from the audience's viewpoint, is something most people dunno they're missing when they watch theater. Its kinda like how architects might see a building versus the structural engineers who actualy make sure it stands up.