College of the Arts clears shop by selling costumes
The Caine College of the Arts costume shop and the Theater Student Association co-sponsored a costume sale Saturday in the Fine Arts Building.
The sale featured costume pieces such as a `50s poodle skirt, old-fashioned hats and a snow-queen style hooped dress. Most of the costumes were priced at less than ten dollars.
Luella Powell, manager of the costume shop, said the purpose of the sale was to clear out articles that would probably never be used in another production and to make room for new pieces to be made or purchased in the future.
“We went through them all one by one,” she said.
Powell said the number of new costumes made or purchased each year depends on the production.
“This year for ‘Legally Blonde’ it’s a 2012 time period, so everything has been bought,” she said. “We are only building about eight items for that show.”
The costume shop tries to pull from their existing stock for the productions as much as possible.
“We have a beautiful vintage stock that people have donated,” Powell said.
Powell said sales like the one on Saturday are held every once in awhile when it gets to the point where there are too many costume pieces for the storage space available. They are not held every year, but there have been several in the past.
The profits from the sale will be split between the costume shop and the Theater Student Association. Powell said the costume shop is saving up to purchase a new sewing machine and intends to put their portion towards one.
Taylor Cummins, a sophomore majoring in theater performance and a member of the Theater Student Association, said the group’s portion of the profits will be put toward promoting their club around campus.
“We want to get our name out there and have more parties to get students from all of the colleges involved,” she said.
Cummins said the majority of the students putting on this year’s annual Halloween show are not theater majors or even art majors at all.
“A lot of them are students that did plays in high school but now they can’t do i
t in college,” she said. “The TSA gives them the chance.”
The Theater Student Association gives students a chance to bring original works alive on stage. The TSA puts on several productions written by students every year. Cummins said the annual Halloween show is usually an original script.
“A student can put on a production anytime they want to,” Cummins said. “They just go to the TSA with their script and say ‘Hey, we’d love to do this.'”
Cummins said the show “Pterodactyls” from early this semester was put on by a Theater Student Association member.
Several theater students were present at the sale, but students from outside the Caine College of the Arts also heard about and attended the sale. Christina Wittwer, a junior majoring in physics, said she heard about the sale on Facebook.
“A couple of my friends were coming to the event so it came up on my page,” she said. “I think this kind of thing is really cool so I decided to come check it out.”
– ashlyn.tucker@aggiemail.usu.edu