8 EASY Belly Dance Troupe Costuming Ideas that ‘WOW’ your audience!

 

If you are part of a troupe, you know the power of belly dance troupe costuming.

 

When troupe members are beautifully dressed in the same theme colour or costume style, it creates a very cohesive look, and makes the performance that much more powerful!

 

….But this kind of troupe costuming can be challenging at the same time.

 

You want all the troupe members to look the same, but you have to keep the cost low, and most likely your members come in a range of sizes.

 

So I asked the lovely members of Sparkly Belly’s Facebook group, “What have you done for outfitting troupes that worked?” 😀

 

This community of amazingly creative ladies came back with lots of ideas, and I want to share some highlights here with you! 🙂

 

8 Easy Belly Dance Troupe Costuming Ideas!

 

Here’s Inspire Bellydance troupe in Sydney, Australia, shared by Rachel Bond!

 

Rachel says the skirts were based on Sparkly Belly’s 5-panel mermaid skirt pattern modified to 3 panels. They used plain lycra with an extra layer of sequin mesh around the hips.

 

Bras were picked by the dancers, and covered with plain lycra. Then they decorated the bras with sequin mesh ruched over the cups. You can learn how to do ruching in this tutorial 🙂

 

The matching belly stockings are from SeeFit. But if you want to make your own, here’s my belly stocking tutorial!

 

With matching decorative elements, they have gorgeous troupe costumes! 😀 Thank you Rachel for sharing this!

 

 

 

Above is an example of Bellydance Evolution costuming, shared by Omega Rakkelita!

 

According to Omega, “In Bellydance Evolution, we use loads of stretchy tops that don’t have bra cups because they have to be used by multiple dancers. Same thing with belts and skirts. And it’s easier when the fabric already has lots of shine, sequins, etc.” 

 

I LOVE the concept! And it’s also nice to have different style options made from the same materials, which creates more visual interest for the troupe costuming 🙂 Thank you, Omega!

 

 

 

Above is Krysalis from Levin, New Zealand, shared by Sara Hamer and explained by Lori Smaling!

 

Lori explains that the above dresses were made based on a pattern, and they can be worn in different ways!

 

The same gold fabric used in everyone’s dress must look amazing on stage!

 

Here’s another one from Krysalis 🙂

 

 

Lori says “This was adapted from costumes bought online. Our wardrobe mistress Sandra Pearson worked with each lady to make sure she was comfortable the veils worn round the hips lovely and sparkly whilst we did candle dance”

 

It’s a great idea to buy simple costumes and add your own flare! Look at those gorgeous smiles 🙂

 

Thank you, Sara and Lori!

 

 

To the right is Jessikah & Johara Sirens, photo by Laurie Hall!

 

These ladies made matching mermaid skirts together from the Sparkly Belly tutorial 🙂 Tutorial here.

 

Jessikah also made a matching shrug, which creates a nice, complete look with the skirt 🙂 You can make your own shrug with my tutorial here.

 

I personally like the choice of gold velvet for the matching skirts, because velvet gives a luxurious look. This gold is quite neutral too, so it goes with different colours of bras and belts!

 

Thanks Jessikah for sharing this!

 

 

 

To the left is Karen’s troupe, Aaliyah Dancers 🙂

 

They created the skirts based on Sparkly Belly’s mermaid skirt tutorial.

 

They bought inexpensive bras through a dance company and Karen had to change out straps so they work for them 🙂

 

Then Karen added the fringe and black fabric to the tops of the bras because they were low cut.

 

The fringe with big paillettes is such a lovely touch, as well as the mix of black and silver.

 

We often avoid black for stage performance, but by mixing in silver, it becomes a great costume! 🙂

 

Thank you, Karen!

 

 

 

 

Above photo was shared by Sascha Olivier-Sampson!

 

Sascha made these super cute costumes, and the skirts can accommodate different sizes because its a wrap skirt!

 

You can see the shiny fabric does a great job of turning the outfit into a stage costume!

 

You can see how to add fabric to bras like Sascha did in this tutorial 🙂

 

Thank you, Sascha!

 

And last but not least… in the above photo is Mythic Moves, shared by Catherine! In the back is their drummer Daniel A Stucky, a founding member of their troupe. The pirates are Taylor Brown and Aneaj Bokor.

 

Catherine says, “It was easy for us to look unified in this costume despite us all having different bras, different hair color, different tights color, because we kept the major details the same. We all used the same fabric for the belts, armbands, and covering the bras. We all drew out of a common bin for embellishing our bras too so the same detail was repeated across all of our costumes.

We also all wore the same makeup, as in literally the same color of lipstick and the same colors of eyeshadow which helped tie us together a bit better.”

 

Really well put together, right?

 

They covered existing bras and added what Catherine calls jellyfish frills based on this tutorial 😀

 

I love the jellyfish frills! They create such a mysterious look with the stage light in the photo!

 

 

There are even more creative ideas shared in this thread in the Facebook group! Check out the thread here 🙂

 

 

 

Lessons Learned

 

Here are common threads and lessons I found in these belly dance troupe costuming ideas! 🙂

 

1. Use shiny fabric or fabric with prints or sequins – Using “busy” fabrics, you don’t have to decorate as much 🙂 This saves time and potentially cost too. Great fabric goes a long way!

 

2. Pick the same fabric and decoration items, and members make their own costumes – you can achieve a cohesive look while each member can make their costume to their liking 🙂 The subtle differences also make it visually interesting.

 

3. Consider adjustable designs – when a costume size is adjustable, it can be worn by different dancers. You can do so by using stretch fabric, or making a wrap skirt etc 🙂

 

4. Make simple, staple skirts that can be combined with different bedlahs etc – Did you notice that many of the above troupes used Sparkly Belly’s mermaid skirt pattern? The skirt can be made to fit each person, and it’s pretty simple to make. And once you have matching skirts, each troupe member can wear their own bedlah and you’ll still look cohesive! 🙂

 

If you’re interested in making the same mermaid skirt, I have a 5-day challenge where you can learn to make it! Due to popular demand, I’m running it EVERY WEEK now, so it would be fun for the whole troupe to join and make matching skirts together!

 

Learn more about the mermaid skirt challenge and join here!

 

 

Hope you found lots of neat ideas in this post! If you want to find more costuming ideas, Sparkly Belly’s Facebook group is a great place to do so! Join the group here!

 

Thanks again to Rachel, Omega, Sara, Lori, Jessica, Karen, Sascha and Catherine and all their troupe members and Sparkly Belly FB group members for sharing their amazingly inspiring ideas!!!

 

Thanks for reading, and keep sparkling! 🙂