Classic City Vibes

Blending Classical Elegance with Modern Storytelling: A Journey with Dancer and Choreographer Eva Ellerbre

• Athens Regional Library System • Episode 83

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What happens when classical elegance meets modern storytelling? Join us as we sit down with the incredibly talented Eva Elarbee, whose journey from a three-year-old in ballet slippers at the Joan Mann Dance Studio to a multifaceted dancer, choreographer, and living history interpreter, is nothing short of inspiring. 


Bio : Eva Elarbee is an Athens native with a passion for vintage fashion. She grew up helping at her mom’s costume shop, and from that, developed a deep love for historic textiles. Her favorite eras include the 1890s-1910s and the 1950s. When not restoring items in her vintage collection, Eva enjoys bird watching, playing board games, and working as a dance teacher. She’s looking forward to sharing her collection with the Athens community on March 23rd during her “Getting Dressed” demonstration.

Dancer's Journey Through Different Styles

Speaker 1

All right, welcome to Classic City Vibes. We have with us today Eva Ellerbre, who is a dancer choreographer, living history interpreter.

Speaker 2

Absolutely.

Speaker 1

Maybe some other things that we'll get into? We'll see. Let's start with dance, though. When did you first kind of fall in?

Speaker 2

love with dance class with the Joan Mann Dance Studio because she wanted to wear me out. I had a lot of energy. I was a very rambunctious child and she wanted to channel some of that energy. She thought that dance would be a great place to put me in. I loved it immediately. I enjoyed ballet a lot. I liked making noise with tap dance. And then my true love for dance started, probably in elementary school, fourth or fifth grade, when I really started to be able to do the moves better. I started to add contemporary ballet, we did some jazz, we did a little hip hop and then when I got into high school I started ballroom dancing and just all of the different styles blending together really gave me a love for dance even more, because I could take a little bit from ballroom and put it into jazz. I could take the foundations of ballet, put it into hip hop, and it was just this amazing compilation of styles that I was able to do. So how old were you when you first started?

Speaker 1

Three years old Three Wow yeah.

Speaker 2

That's the youngest that Miss Joan will take kids.

Speaker 1

So you started the very youngest you could, and you've never stopped.

Speaker 2

Nope.

Speaker 1

Yeah, so was there ever you had all these different styles? Were any of the styles kind of more of a favorite for you?

Speaker 2

Yes. So contemporary ballet is my favorite. It takes all of the beautiful, elegant foundations of classical ballet but then adds a storytelling component to it. So you have really fluid arms, you have a really expressive face and you're normally dancing to more modern music or music that tells a story. So it's you plus the music telling the story. Together it's really beautiful.

Speaker 1

Is it still kind of following the rules of ballet? Is that separated from, like modern dance, which maybe has different Right?

Speaker 2

Contemporary ballet is a little bit more modern than modern ballet. Modern ballet came about in the 1930s and it explored a lot with instrumental music. Contemporary ballet uses a lot of modern songs, some instrumental music as well. It's a little bit different, though, than traditional modern ballet as a genre.

Speaker 1

And which one was your favorite.

Speaker 2

Contemporary ballet.

Speaker 1

What about choreography? What's the first kind of attempt? You did actually choreography in your own piece.

Speaker 2

Yes, choreography what's the first kind of attempt? You did actually choreography in your own piece. Yes, so, beyond doing little pieces like for school productions, my first main piece of choreography was in 2015. I did a tap dance to Just Can't Wait to Be King from the Lion King. It was hilarious, it was.

Speaker 1

Is it on video?

Speaker 2

It is on video yes, we wore red feathered sequined costumes. We thought we were the cutest things.

Speaker 1

Love it.

Speaker 2

It was definitely big on the acting and on the cute factor. Not as much technical dancing that would come later but it was so much fun. I did it with a really sweet group of girls that I danced with for a long time. We did it in our yearly recital and it was just so much fun to do a Disney song that everyone knew and to do a dance to it.

Speaker 1

Is it different for you when you're performing your own piece versus someone else's?

Speaker 2

Yes, that is actually a really interesting question. Else's? Yes, that is actually a really interesting question. I find that I forget my own choreography worse than I do other people's, because I'm remembering all of the different choreography that I went to to get to that final state and sometimes that old choreography will pop back in and I'll think, whoops, nope, I didn't go with that move, I went with a different move. But when I learn someone else's choreography, you just learn it straight through.

Speaker 1

Straight through.

Speaker 2

And it pretty much doesn't change in your mind.

Speaker 1

That was one of my questions was in choreography. You know, in film there's a script and the director can go way off script. In a play it kind of follows the play. For the most part In choreography if you're doing a piece, how set in stone is that piece?

Speaker 2

Right. So the choreography that I do is mostly set in stone just because of the settings that I teach in. I teach at a dance studio, so I pretty much bring the choreography for the day and present it to the students. If I were maybe in an artistic company, we might do more of a back and forth with me and my dancers. I might ask them for feedback or ask them for ideas and then from there build a piece. But for the most part and even in theater too, I pretty much bring the dances to them and then teach it. If there's any major roadblocks, I might readjust the choreography just to see if the dancer's better, but for the most part I have it set in my mind ahead of time.

Speaker 1

Do you spend more of your time teaching now than dancing, or what's kind of the mix in your life now?

The Art of Choreographing Music

Speaker 2

Yeah, so I'm teaching most of the classes at the Joan Mann Dance Studio. Right now that's three days a week. And then I'm teaching most of the classes at the Joan Mann Dance Studio right now that's three days a week. And then I'm teaching with a theater company Thursday evenings and I did Athens Creative Theater's fall show of Anastasia. That was a blast. It was amazing. That was in the fall semester last year and then this semester I'm choreographing Westminster's spring musical Finding Nemo. So a lot of it is teaching. At the moment I take one dance class at my dance studio. It's one that I both take and teach. But we have another lady who comes in and teaches hip hop and jazz and I love learning from her because she has a different perspective than I have and I'm able to just learn from her and incorporate some of her styles into my moves as well.

Speaker 1

Nice and does some of that make it to your class eventually too?

Speaker 2

Yes, so as a choreographer I try to respect other choreographers and not straight up steal their moves, but I'm definitely influenced by and I think I'm a better choreographer for taking multiple styles of dance and like meeting other choreographers.

Speaker 1

When you're creating a piece, when you start, do you kind of have an idea or do you kind of like listen to the music. How does that process work of the creation?

Speaker 2

Listening to the music is the biggest thing. I listen to a lot of music just in my day-to-day life, trying to find songs that speak to me, and then, when I decide to choreograph to a song, I listen to it nonstop, on repeat, over and over. I find out where the music goes up, where it goes down, where it swells, I listen to all of the lyrics and figure out what they're saying precisely, and then from there I don't have to start choreographing right at the beginning of a song. If the chorus is really speaking to me, then I will jump in there and just get myself excited on a piece of choreography and from there I'll build out the rest of the song.

Speaker 1

So when you're listening to music, what makes a good piece of music for choreography?

Speaker 2

That's a very interesting question. A lot of it is the tempo. A song has to be what I call danceable. We normally work in 4-4 counts, so that's what most of your songs are going to be in. Nowadays. It's what a lot of our moves are meant to be set to, especially in jazz.

Speaker 1

So jazz is 4-4, even though a lot of jazz is not 4-4.

Speaker 2

Right, yeah, most of jazz that I do is in 4-4. Okay, some of it is not 4-4. Right, yeah, most of jazz that I do is in 4-4. Oh, okay, some of it's in 3-4. Sometimes you get 6-8, like that really fast waltzy feel, but mostly 4-4 for me. I do enjoy using a lot of pop songs, just so that my students know the song and have a connection to it.

Speaker 1

It's more fun for them that way too. Oh yeah, for sure yeah they probably don't know as much jazz at that age. Right, what has been some of your favorite pieces of choreography?

Speaker 2

So it's hard to pick an absolute favorite. But one of my top pieces was a dance that we did in the recital last year. It was to a song called Get Back your Fight by Sarah Reeves and it has the most gorgeous message to it. It's throwing off your emotional baggage with the help of your friends and getting back your fight eventually. It's just a really cool song that you know life is going to throw a bunch of stuff at you but you persevere and you become stronger for it.

Speaker 2

So we did a contemporary ballet dance with scarves and our scarves represented that emotional baggage that we all carry around. So we danced this piece with our scarves, whirling around us, kind of over our head, weighing us down, weighing us down. Then, towards the end of the dance, some of the girls ganged up on me and threw their scarves onto me and whirled me around the room with the scarves. But then at the very end of the song, one friend came in, picked me up off the ground, helped me throw off my scarves and we ended the piece emotion-free, with our scarves on the ground, and it was a really cool piece. I think the audience enjoyed it. It was more powerful and emotional than a lot of the pieces that we do, but it was with a group of really sweet senior girls and I think it was special for them to do together.

Speaker 1

Well, actually, you know, I was thinking. You know, when you inquired earlier, I was thinking more of the music, but it's the lyrics. That can be just as.

Speaker 2

For sure yeah.

Speaker 1

Kind of the component that you latch on to. I guess for that.

Speaker 2

Yeah, with this, the chorus was promise one day you're going to get back your fight. So we did a lot of fighting to overcome and it was a really cool dance.

Speaker 1

Very cool, you think, do you redo dances very often?

Speaker 2

I do, yes, Honestly. I especially redo little kids' dances. There's only so much you can teach a 4-year-old.

Speaker 1

You find ones that work and you stick with it.

Speaker 2

Yes, we cycle those dances around Every 3 or 4 years. That same dance is going to come back.

Speaker 1

It's the foundation, the foundation you work with. So what is kind of the trajectory of a choreographer with what you want to do when? Do you kind of want to take your choreography.

Speaker 2

Honestly for me, I am very content and proud to stay as a hometown choreographer. I don't have ambitions to go to New York and choreograph For me. I started hometown. I have a really great spot right now teaching, and I think there's great value in teaching kids in your own area and also understanding that not everyone you teach is going to want to go to Broadway Like a lot of kids just need that energy outlet that I had and you know it teaches them coordination. It teaches them cooperation with each other, having to dance and learn from someone else. I think that's a really valuable thing for kids to learn, just apart from dance the idea of learning from someone else, learning musicality, keeping yourself fit and healthy all those things you learn from dance.

Speaker 1

Well, that's great because it's a healthy way to look at things too, because, you know, it's about the love of dance. It's like music, like 90% of us who learn music, we're not going to, you know, tour the country tour the world. It's not really about that. It's about the actual joy of making music and things like that.

Speaker 2

For sure, do you play an instrument?

Speaker 1

Not well, but yeah.

Speaker 2

But you have that connection to music, yeah, that connection.

Speaker 1

So that's kind of making the same, like I can see the draw, like also just the idea of the local and the people you grow up with and like influencing them and just showing them this joy that they can have their whole life.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker 1

And they don't need to go to New York for that. Precisely yeah.

Speaker 2

That's something really cool about our studio is Miss Joan has been in business for over 40 years here, so she has children of students who've come back to her studio and it's like a big family there because all of the teachers hang out together. We all enjoy learning from each other and then we get children who come back and adult children who come back to visit us.

Speaker 1

That's wonderful. Is there a type of dance that's more difficult for you than others?

Speaker 2

as a general rule, yes, hip-hop I definitely struggle with.

Speaker 1

That's why it's so good for me to learn it. What makes it kind of unique?

Speaker 2

There's a lot of isolations in hip-hop so you have to be able to isolate your rib cage, isolate your knees, your shoulders, your head, and I like to be more fluid, like ballet Right, so those sharp, strong isolations really give me some trouble, but I try.

Speaker 1

And you enjoy. It.

Speaker 2

I do. I wouldn't say I enjoy hip hop as a style personally, but I enjoy learning it because it's good for me, because it expands my horizons, it challenges me, but I still don't enjoy the style as much as I do others.

Speaker 1

Is there a style that you haven't really tried yet that you might be interested in? Are you pretty much?

Speaker 2

That's a good question. In Are you pretty much? That's a good question. I mentioned ballroom and I've done that for 10 or 15 years now. I would enjoy learning more Latin styles of ballroom, so salsa, cha-cha, bachata, and those actually have a lot of isolation in them. You have to isolate your hips, and those actually have a lot of isolation in them. You have to isolate your hips. You have a figure eight pattern with your hips that you use, so I would enjoy learning more of that.

Speaker 1

Is that kind of. When you think of dance, do you think of, like ballroom, those kind of things separately from like?

Speaker 2

ballet I do overall yeah.

Speaker 1

What do you get from those that you don't get from? You know, like doing ballet, or modern or jazz.

Speaker 2

So ballroom, dance is a conversation with your partner. You are very much tied and connected to that partner. They give you signals back and forth and you get to respond to those signals with different moves. So ballroom is a lot more about talking to that person across from you. Yeah, dance.

Speaker 1

And there's not spectators. That's true Usually, yeah. Right Unless it's a competition, I guess, right, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2

Yeah, we just do social ballroom dances. So I go with my husband to a dance, but then we all mix partners around. We meet different people and that's a lot of fun, just to meet people who share a passion with you.

Speaker 1

Is there a big community of that here in Athens, or do you have to go to Atlanta?

Speaker 2

Yeah, there's a really good swing dance community here in Athens. We host Classic City Swing every year. It's like a big convention. People from all over the country come into Athens to take the swing dance weekend. But then we also have some weekly swing dance groups that meet and then the UGA Ballroom Performance Group hosts a ballroom dance every other Friday. They do a lesson ahead of time and then a social dance afterwards. That's where I started learning ballroom and it was a really wonderful place to start that interest.

Exploring Historical Fashion and Dance

Speaker 1

So if someone's listening to this and they've never done any dance whatsoever in their life, except maybe in front of the mirror when they're little kids listening to a pop song, could they start there?

Speaker 2

Absolutely. That would be a wonderful place. The ballroom performance group has a lot of students in it, but it also opens up to the community, so you have adults of all ages there, all skill levels, who just come together and practice their dance. It's a lot of fun, that's great.

Speaker 1

Let's shift gears a little bit and talk about kind of the other part. We talked about the history.

Speaker 2

My other interest. Yes, your other interest yes, interpretive history.

Speaker 1

How would you describe what you do with history?

Speaker 2

Yeah, we're often called living history interpreters. Yeah, we're often called living history interpreters. So the idea that we are living out or demonstrating history. Now some people go full blast into this and like character and live as a first-person interpreter. I don't do that. I like my modern plumbing and my heating. I respect those people.

Speaker 1

Do you do first-person, though? Not very often. Not very often.

Speaker 2

For specific instances, I do Like I did a skit where I was a Civil War spy. There was a young lady who hid messages in her elaborate hairdo and of course no one would dare to search her hairdo. So that was a skit that I did for a while as a first-person interpreter, but no, most of the time I acknowledge that I'm a modern person, that I like being a modern person, but that I have this knowledge I like to share in a historic context.

Speaker 1

Did you?

Speaker 2

do acting as well Not as much so. My mom owns a costume shop, so I grew up surrounded by creativity and funky clothes, and I would go to performances with her and help her backstage. So I've been exposed to theater all my life, but most of my performing stuck with dance.

Speaker 1

So that kind of brings me to that question about where you got interested in the historical part. Sounds like maybe a little bit from that, or were you a history nerd growing up Right, or both?

Speaker 2

They kind of developed in parallel. I would say the costumes started first. But being interested in costumes gave me an anchor point to look into history. So say I really liked my Renaissance Festival costume. Well then that would prompt me to do research into the Renaissance, look into the technological advances, what society was doing, what all of the royal families were doing during that time. Or say I liked late 1700s clothes. Well, what was happening during then American Revolution and setting up our country? So when I was interested in a fashion that would prompt me to look into what was happening during that time period.

Speaker 1

So the fashion would come first and then you would do the history to kind of tie those two together, right, yeah, interesting.

Speaker 2

And it's so interesting to see how fashion and society and history are interlinked. Bridgerton is super popular right now. So those high-waisted dresses, fairly straight skirts compared to the rest of history that we see. Those dresses became popular because Napoleon was excavating large amounts of the ancient world and we saw all of these beautiful ladies in draped clothing, lots of gentle, flowing lines, not a lot of harsh corsetry during that time. So women of the time early 1800s into 1820s wore those diaphanous flowing dresses to remind them of the ancient world, because that was what was popular during that time.

Speaker 1

Are you learning like you're in the 1800s? You're learning about history. Are you also learning like? What kind of dances did they do then? Yes, that would seem very interesting.

Speaker 2

I actually do historic dancing. So over New Year's we went to a historic ball up in Chattanooga and we did mid-1800s dances. We did a lot of polkas, a lot of waltz quadrilles, where you've got four couples facing each other, and we dressed up in historic costumes for that. Oh, what fun.

Speaker 1

And did you know those dances before you went? Or do you go, and they kind of teach the dances and everyone learns and everyone does it.

Speaker 2

Right, a mix of both. I was familiar with probably half of the dances, and then from there the caller would walk them through ahead of time and then we would actually go to do them later.

Speaker 1

It probably helps a lot that you have so much dance experience. You can probably pick things up like that yeah, the timing helps.

Speaker 2

I know all of the basic moves. They're just in a different pattern in different dances.

Speaker 1

And do you make? Do you like to make a lot of your own?

Speaker 2

We do. Yes, my mom and I make almost all of my historic outfits. She is a wonderful seamstress. She is a lot better with using patterns than I am. I'm still working on the whole pattern thing, but I enjoy remaking or repurposing outfits. So one of my favorite things to do is to make circle skirts out of tablecloths, because you have all of these beautiful vintage tablecloths at thrift stores that have hand embroidery on them. You know, someone's put a lot of effort into them and I can cut a hole in the center, put a waistband on it, put a zipper up the back and then it makes a beautiful skirt. Oh fun.

Speaker 1

I'm going to guess you're a person who loves thrift stores.

Speaker 2

Oh yes, I hit up all the thrift stores in Athens.

Speaker 1

They probably have a lot, because you'll see some historic outfits in there. And don't you sell as well I do yeah, I sell on Etsy at Lacey Layers.

Speaker 2

I do mostly 1940s through 1980s, with the focus on 50s.

Speaker 1

What's your favorite time period as far as fashion?

Speaker 2

Oh to wear every day. 1950s for sure.

Speaker 1

What do you like about it?

Speaker 2

I feel like the silhouette suits me. I'm fairly short, so like flowy things, like mod dresses in the 60s. I feel like those don't do much on me, so I like that defined waist and the full skirt of 1950s. Also, because I'm a dancer, I like that flowy skirt, so I will put a big petticoat under my dresses and swish around.

Speaker 1

How much is just fashion part of your life in general? Do you keep, I mean, contemporary? Does that influence you at all, or are you just more into just historical?

Speaker 2

Oh, I love contemporary fashion as well. I enjoy mixing it Like today I'm wearing a vintage skirt but a modern sweater, and that's what I often like to do, Because you can look too costumey if you just wear a full-on 1950s dress, Like that's a little too far. I do like to avoid looking like I'm wearing a costume.

Speaker 1

Well, that makes sense.

Speaker 2

yes, yes, because I do wear costumes.

Speaker 1

Sometimes you want to look like that for an event, right? Yes, sometimes you want to look like that for an event right?

Speaker 2

Yes, but I love being able to mix eras, like to wear a vintage skirt and vintage shoes and then a modern crop top. It's a lot of fun.

Speaker 1

It's great not to be confined by like what's contemporary, what's old, you can just take whatever interests you. Is there kind of like a time period that you're like no, not for me at all that you kind of dislike the most?

Creative Projects and Historical Exploration

Speaker 2

We'll throw some shade on a decade. Absolutely Honestly, I don't like 1810s, 1820s, that Bridgerton era.

Speaker 1

Oh really.

Speaker 2

I know I don't think it has a lot going for it.

Speaker 1

Are you watching that show? Though I am. Do you enjoy the show? Though I am. Do you enjoy the show?

Speaker 2

Yes, I've definitely watched that show and I like the costumes on the show, but of course they've taken a lot of creative liberties with them. But think like Jane Austen, a lot of those movies are a lot more historically accurate and to me I think the dresses are very sweet. They just don't have a lot of interest boring right? That's probably a word that people not you, oh no, but some people might, yes, think of it that way. Yeah, yes.

Speaker 1

Yeah, very cool. Do you have a project that you're working on right now? What are your projects right now?

Speaker 2

So most of my time is currently taken up with choreography. Like we mentioned earlier, I've got that school show coming up, I coach a worship team, I'm with a theater group, I'm teaching classes three days a week, so that's where a lot of my mental energy is, just because I have to prepare choreography ahead of time and we do combination classes at my dance studio, so we do tap, jazz and ballet for everyone, plus contemporary and hip hop for the older girls. So I have to come to class each day with all of those dances prepared and that's a lot on my mind, but it's what I love doing.

Speaker 2

As far as historical costuming goes, my next project will be making a Renaissance-inspired dress. We're going to a Renaissance festival up near Helen in a few weeks and my mom got me this gorgeous emerald green tiara for Christmas and I want a new dress to go with that tiara. So my plan is to make a Renaissance-inspired dress from a 1980s prom dress. It's dark green, it's got an embroidered bodice, big puffy sleeves, v-waist, full skirt and I'm going to cut the skirt down the center, open up the side pieces so that you can see an underskirt, put some beading on the bodice, put longer sleeves on the bottom of it with some cross hatching and probably cut the neck into a square neckline so that it reads more historic.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker 1

How much does that matter to you when you go to these events so that it's historically accurate?

Speaker 2

Not very much the Renaissance Festival. I will wear anything fantasy related.

Speaker 1

Those are a little looser in their history. Precisely so if there's, you know, there's Renaissance fairs, there's a lot of like Civil War reenactments, but you're probably more limited in other time periods, or am I wrong about that? Is there starting to be certain time periods that you don't see very often? If you were to see like, oh, we got to go to that because there's not Right.

Speaker 2

So there is a huge emphasis on Civil War reenacting. I would love to see some other time periods explored more. My favorite historic time period is the 1890s. It was just this incredible time of launching into the modern age. You see women entering the workforce en masse in professional capacities and then the fashion reflects that. So you see a lot of influence for men's clothing in women's fashion during the 1890s and it is just so cool to track that social change plus the fashion change. So I would love to see more reenactments or focus on that time period, kind of that turn of the century, even into World War I in 1920s, Like so much happened in those few decades and we really skip over those a lot.

Speaker 1

I would think there would be a lot of 20s, wouldn't there? Because you know we're in 20s and the fun dances are there is a lot on the 20s.

Speaker 2

Not a lot of it is historically accurate. There's just a lot of yay. We're going to wear fringe and be flappers. You want?

Speaker 1

something a little more than the historic.

Speaker 2

Yeah, a little more less about the parties all the time and you know a little more about actual history. Does that exist at all around here? Not really that.

Speaker 1

I know of. Yeah.

Speaker 2

There's a vintage dance group based out of Atlanta and Chattanooga and they do some historic events, but not too much here in Athens.

Speaker 1

If someone was interested in dance. Is there a choreographer or a piece that?

Speaker 2

you would point them to.

Speaker 1

If someone says I've seen a little dance here and there, I'm not really into it, but I'm going to give it one more try, Right? What would you suggest to someone?

Speaker 2

I am heavily inspired by the Radio City Rockettes in New York City, oh the ones like the tap dance and kick lines.

Speaker 2

Yeah, they are incredible because they also have a blend of styles. All of their dancers have to have a ballet background, but then from there they do a lot of character acting. They do a ton of tap dancing and a lot of jazz, so they're fascinating to watch because you see these beautiful ballerinas suddenly break into a tap dance. I would recommend people go watch them. They have a great social media account. They put a lot of their dances and choreography up on there. Also, the Atlanta Ballet If you just want to experience classical ballet. My husband and I just went to their production of the Nutcracker and it was beautiful. They have a lot of their students perform in the corps de ballet so you can see younger dancers who are still learning perform on stage, but then also their company members who are trained and beautiful.

Speaker 1

What's it like for you going to see something like the Nutcracker, which I'm assuming you've probably seen a lot of times?

Speaker 2

Many versions of the Nutcracker, many versions.

Speaker 1

What's that? Like you know, from someone who is a dancer and is very experienced seeing something that's kind of like always done, and if someone's seen one dance, it's probably that one.

Speaker 2

It's very inspiring. It's so fun to see what people do with the Nutcracker because, like you said, everyone's seen it, but you always want to throw your own twist on it. So this last one we went to see did kind of a steampunk theme. It was all clocks and gears.

Speaker 1

That was probably up your alley then. Right, it was fun. Yes.

Speaker 2

I think they went a little too far into their steampunkness, but I did enjoy it. I enjoyed the effort that was made Right. So yes, that was a lot of fun to see.

Speaker 1

Is there ever any overlap between kind of the historical world and the cosplay world, or do people I mean I know I'm sure there's some overlap, but for the most part do those worlds?

Speaker 2

kind of like eh. I would say I'm one of the overlaps because I enjoy both.

Speaker 1

Are you a cosplayer too? I am Okay.

Speaker 2

I have a lot of Disney cosplays Nice. So I have Cinderella, belle, aurora, tinkerbell, yeah, a few others, I think.

Speaker 1

So you're a perfect person to ask. You know people in both worlds, do you know?

Speaker 2

a lot of people who are in both worlds, other than yourself. Sadly, a lot of the worlds like to snub each other. Yeah, that's what I was afraid of, because you know the um, the historic reenactors will look down on those cosplayers because they put a plastic zipper up the back of their dress and the cosplayers think that reenactors are way too stuffy Might be fair.

Speaker 2

But I think more overlap would be a lot of fun, because you can have your creativity more. In the cosplay realm, you can step into a fantasy character or a character that you've seen in a movie, and that's just so much fun to be someone else. But then, in a historic context, it's fun to be more faithful to the history that you're portraying and to explain the social context of what was going on. And yeah, just to be more accurate. And both of those worlds are fun and have a lot of value.

Speaker 1

And probably your time in the historical world. A lot of those skills translate to making cosplay costumes.

Speaker 2

They do.

Speaker 1

yes, You've got to think so, so we always ask everybody about a book that has had an impact on their life, or just something they've been reading lately that they want to share.

Speaker 2

So my favorite book that I come back to every year actually just re-listened to it this fall is Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman, do you?

Speaker 1

know that one. I do know that one, yes.

Speaker 2

Oh, it's wonderful. It tells about parallel Londons. There's London above, that's just your typical London, and then there's London below, where people who have fallen through the cracks in time end up and a man from London above gets pulled into London below, caught up in this crazy adventure story. And I love it because it includes a lot of history. Like in London Below, you meet like 15th century earls who are stuck in London Below in their own little world, and it's just a fascinating book. It's romantic in the swashbuckling sense. There's a lot of adventure to it, so that's a book that I go back to every few years.

Speaker 1

Do you like normally historical fiction? Because of your I do.

Speaker 2

yeah, I enjoy it. I enjoy seeing what authors do with it, what liberties they take and why they take them. Normally it's just to make for a better story.

Speaker 1

You're not a purist you never like. Oh yeah, no, that's a better attitude.

Speaker 2

I recently read the Bridgerton books. They were hilarious, but I now understand more about that world.

Speaker 1

Neil Gaiman, I think, is such a versatile writer Like there's very few writers who you know have great kids, books, great teen books and great adult books, and you know he does all those things. He is such a great writer.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I honestly haven't read many other books of his. I've read Stardust and loved it because I love the movie.

Speaker 1

I haven't seen the movie.

Speaker 2

It's wonderful. I can highly recommend it, and I've read his short stories on cats.

Speaker 1

Oh, I haven't read those.

Speaker 2

They're good.

Speaker 1

Are you a cat person?

Speaker 2

I am yeah.

Speaker 1

I figured, since you read the books on cats, you're attracted to them. American Gods, that's probably my favorite game and book which is an adult book? Yes, it's a lot.

Speaker 2

I started that one. I don't think I finished it, not for you then I may need to get back to it, though, sorry.

Historical vs Stage Clothing Comparison

Speaker 1

Everybody likes different things. Where can people follow you, find information about you, buy your clothes, that kind of thing?

Speaker 2

So I have an Instagram account, lacy Layers Vintage. That's where I put a lot of my items for sale and I also do personal updates there, so if I've been to a costume event over the weekend, I'll post some fun pictures. As far as buying vintage clothes go, I have an Etsy website, also Lacy Layers and I specialize in 50s and 70s, so if you have a party coming up, feel free to message me on either site and be like hey, I'm going to a 70s disco party, I want a super cool formal to wear and I'll be happy to help you out.

Speaker 1

Very nice, very nice, and we're also going to be doing a library program. I should have mentioned this as well.

Speaker 2

Yes, we are.

Speaker 1

Getting Dressed.

Speaker 2

Yes, a dressing demo from the 1890s. So I'm going to be doing a comparison of historically accurate clothing, but then also the stage equivalent of that clothing. So we'll do a side-by-side getting dressed of stage clothes versus accurate clothes. I think it'll be really fascinating.

Speaker 1

Thank you for coming in. It was a pleasure talking with you.

Speaker 2

Thank you very much, I enjoyed it.