A Closer Look at Madonna’s One-of-a-Kind Celebration Tour Wardrobe
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Come on, Vogue! This weekend, Madonna kicked off her global Celebration World Tour in London, where she treated fans with a career-spanning performance of some of her greatest hits. Almost better than the setlist, however, was the Queen of Pop’s epic new outfits for the stage—well, new in a sense. All of them riff off of her most iconic looks over the years (including, yes, that signature Jean Paul Gaultier cone bra). In honor of the tour’s kickoff, Vogue caught up with costume and creative designer Eyob Yohannes and creative and design lead Rita Melssen to get a closer look at Madonna’s one-of-a-kind, custom-made tour looks.
Given the magnitude of Madonna’s new tour—she’s performing on 78 days across 15 different countries—Yohannes and Melssen needed top-tier stage fashion. To focus the wardrobe and give it a strong, clear message, the duo opted to mimic the theme of the show, which explores Madonna’s four decades of hits. That’s how they landed on referencing some of Madonna’s most famous outfits. “Fashion has always been a part of her storytelling,” says Yohannes, “so we drew from her past stylistically, and we kept those themes within the costumes.”
For the most part, Yohannes and Melssen created and designed all of Madonna’s costumes themselves, though they also enlisted designers such as Vetement’s Guram Gvasalia, Donatella Versace, Jean Paul Gaultier, and Dilara Findikoglu to create special one-off looks for her, too. “We wanted to reference everything that she’s done, and make something new out of that,” says Melssen. “We created a whole new world.”
The tour traces Madonna’s meteoric rise to superstardom, beginning back in the ’80s. Yohannes and Melssen began their research by looking at Madonna’s polaroids and performances from the era. “There were a lot of grunge and punk kids, but also the New Romantics,” says Yohannes. “This section feels like being at a New York club, where all of these different cultures meld together.”
Act one opens with her singles such as “Burning Up” and “Everybody.” For the latter track, Madonna sports a punky tailcoat by Findikoglu, inspired by an archival blazer that the singer wore for a performance in Japan back in the ’80s. “It was a men’s coat that she got from a vintage store,” says Yohannes. “[For the new one,] we tricked it out, and added memorabilia and pins from the ’80s onto it. It was very much an ode to New York in the ’80s.”
For act two, Madonna moves into the ’90s with “Erotica” and “Vogue.” The costume duo wanted to explore the songs’s themes of sexual expression and liberation. “We had an idea to make it about boxing,” says Yohannes. “The dancers are all dressed in boxing clothes, and M is in a boxing robe—but then there’s this beautiful sensuality when she unveils a slip dress.”
