Arcadia by Tom Stoppard

First place winner of SETC’s 2022 Undergrad Costume Design Competition.

These theoretical designs were for a Costume Design Studio Class. Like the mythological garden for which it is named, Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia is a masterpiece of idyllic chaos at a close glance, but when looked at from far away, there is a perfect rhythmic harmony throughout. In my design, I chose to follow the mathematical themes first discovered and introduced by Thomasina Coverly, being those of chaos theory, and the laws of fractal relativity. While both are laid into the very structure of the show, the idea of chaos theory is most present in the designs for the main characters of Thomasina and Septimus. Both characters maintain a rigid appearance through most of the show, but as the story progresses and the attraction or chaos of human desire grows between them, their appearance changes and shifts until we see them in the final scene, waltzing in the gazebo at night in naught but their shirtsleeves and nightwear.