1980s a becoming one of our most popular fancy dress costume themes. The choice of 80′s costumes is growing all the time, giving you,the customer, so much more of a range to choose from.
When you look back to the 1980s, one of the things that you will remember is big hair and big shoulder pads , for the ladies, and the men wearing make up and asymmetrical haircuts (why did our parents let us out looking like this, we’ll probably never know!). Other common fashion trends were ra-ra skirts and gypsy skirts, with the shell suit a far too common a site on every high street! Dance wear was all the rage, taking the lead from Fame, so neon, leotards, leggings and leg warmers were also the things to be wearing.
One hundred and one years ago today, in France, ‘modern’ neon tube lighting was demonstrated for the first time at the Paris Motor Show. Its inventor, Georges Claude, maintained a virtual monopoly on this process of lighting a gas with electricity and neon lighting was something of a status symbol for businesses, especially in America in the 1930s/40s. Although neon still has its place, it has been superseded by other, more modern lighting technologies and yet in the costuming field it is still popular.
For a start, the 1980s continues to be a popular theme trend, and a part of that is the Jane Fonda-style workout wear and the club-wear in bright neon colours – leotards, vests, gloves, socks etc. And whilst we’re talking about the club scene, day-glo ‘neon’ make-up and body-paint continues to be popular. This make-up in bright colours works well in any normal face/body-paint design anyway, but really comes into its own when worn under Ultra-Violet lighting – and even if your venue has not got UV, it is possible to find portable UV torches which mean you can create your own personal UV environment, in which to create a glowing impression.
We were talking earlier this week about the filming of a new series of Dallas and thinking about TV Nostalgia. We are reminded of this today, as September 25th marks the 65th birthday of actress, Felicity Kendal. Inspired by one of her most memorable roles, that of Barbara Good in the 1970s sitcom ‘The Good Life’, we thought we should take a look at one of the off-the-wall themes we get from time to time, that of Fruit and Vegetables. More often than not costume requests are more for campaigns and promotional activities to inspire people to eat healthily, rather than parties. However, the theme of ‘Fruit & Vegetables’ is a little limited, so we thought we’d offer you a 70′s & 80′s costume theme today
Today’s fancy dress theme is all about the 80′s as today is Tom Cruise’s 49th birthday (born 1962). One of the most popular and enduring images of any Tom Cruise film is his role as Maverick in the 1986 film Top Gun. This went on general release in the UK on the 3rd October, which means that in 2011 it will be celebrating its 25th anniversary. Theoretically Top Gun 2 is supposedly in development, but with a current proposed date of 2013, we won’t be holding our breath. Eighties parties are still extremely popular with us here at Props N Frocks, but many people find it a challenging theme as the range of 1980s costumes is still developing. As we have mentioned previously, there are various 1980s films for which we have costumes. These include Amadeus, Beetlejuice, Ghostbusters; an Officer and a Gentleman and, of course, Top Gun. But if you are not interested in films from the period, maybe music might be more to your taste. Whether it’s the New Romantic era, punk, heavy metal, rock or pop, we have costumes for all sorts of 1980s musical stars. This was the time when music came of age and the MTV generation was born.
Take a look at some of our 80s Fancy Dress ideas, we have a great selection,with Next day delivery available
Today we go retro with all things 1980s for our fancy dress theme, as we celebrate the birth of John Belushi, who was born on January 24th 1949. Unfortunately, he met an untimely death, aged just 33 years, from a drug overdose on March 5th 1982, but he still represents one of the classic films to come out of the 1980s, ‘The Blues Brothers’. As you no doubt know we have some fantastic 1980s costumes to choose from. Aside from the Blues Brothers accessories including porkpie hat, tie and glasses we can also offer some other classic costumes from 1980s films. What about a US Naval officer costume as portrayed by Richard Gere in ‘An Officer and a Gentleman’? Or, if that seems a bit tame, you could always go totally OTT as An American Werewolf, Freddie Kruegar, or even the classic Michael Jackson Thriller outfit.
Talking of Michael Jackson (which of course a lot of people have been recently) he was one of the classic musical artists of the 1980s, and subsequent decades, who was constantly reinventing his style. Other Eighties popstars you could go as include Madonna, Cyndi Lauper, Boy George and Adam Ant. Take a look at our range of 1980s costumes
Some 80s films that may help you with costume inspiration…
range to choose from.
