Trisha Biggar was the costume designer for all three Star Wars Prequels: Episode I The Phantom Menace, Episode II Attack of the Clones, and Episode III Revenge of the Sith. Biggar’s costumes for Padmé Amidala alone would have placed her in a special place in the hearts of Star Wars fans (especially cosplayers). Biggar also had a cameo in The Phantom Menace as an aide to Orn Free Taa.
Before her work on the Star Wars prequels, Biggar designed the costumes for a few The Aventures of the Young Indiana Jones TV movies and recently she has worked on the TV series Da Vinci’s Demons and Emerald City. TV Guide talked with Biggar about the elaborate costumes for Emerald City. Biggar has also designed costumes for several theatre companies throughout her career, including opera productions.
Somehow Biggar was not nominated for an Academy Award for her work on the Star Wars prequels, but she was nominated for her work in Revenge of the Sith by the Costume Designers Guild Awards and she won the Saturn Award for Best Costumes for both The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones.
There are many resources for fans who want to learn more about the making of the costumes in the Star Wars prequels starting with Biggar’s book Dressing a Galaxy: The Costumes of Star Wars. That book is hard to come by, but Amy Ratcliffe’s article for Star Wars.com that uses Dressing a Galaxy as a source has you covered with six things you might not know about the prequel trilogy costumes.
This webisode shows Biggar working with George Lucas and many of people who worked to design and construct the costumes for The Phantom Menace. Here’s a similar webisode from Attack of the Clones and one more webisode from Revenge of the Sith.
Many of Trisha Biggar’s costumes can be seen in person in the Star Wars and the Power of Costume exhibit which has been traveling the world. I saw it last year and can’t recommend it enough. If you can’t make it there in person you can check out this behind the scenes video from Rocky Mountain PBS. There are also some great photos and information about the costumes in the exhibit from Kristen Baver’s article on the official Star Wars site.
Check out the entire list of women in 365 Days of Star Wars Women in the Women in Star Wars Index. It includes highlights from each post plus notes which posts include new 365 interviews with actresses, writers, artists, and more.
