After 18 years, a burned-out Dwayne Ibsen gave up his post as an Omaha high school drama teacher and took his costumes with him. He had paid for materials used in nearly every period outfit, often sending cloth and drawings home with actors, expecting them to find a seamstress and bring back finished pieces. When his teaching career ended, Ibsen had costumes everywhere. It was the most natural thing in the world to rent them out from a small strip-center shop.
Thirty-five years later, the award-winning Ibsen’s Costume Gallery is the largest of its kind in the Midwest. It has shipped to shows in 40 states, and, among many other awards, has twice won the Grand International Award of the National Costumers Association. The winning costumes were ensembles for Marie Antoinette and Titania in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
Ibsen’s has clothed hundreds, maybe thousands, of actors and actresses, singers, partiers, period performers and VIPs, including making the inaugural ball gown for Nebraska’s first female governor. For Broadway’s “Beauty and the Beast,” the gallery designed and created 200 costumes used in more than 40 productions.
The secret to Ibsen’s costuming success is not numbers, though. It’s quality.
“Because I have a background in theater, I know all the plays and characters,” Ibsen explains. “That makes it twice as easy to communicate what’s needed. I also have an art background and an eye for what works.”
Custom costuming, says Ibsen, is a dying art. Many large, successful shops rely heavily on retail masquerade instead of theater. When 30-day Halloween shops opened, they took a big chunk of business from traditional shops, and the Internet took the rest. “I get a call at least once a month now saying a shop is going out of business,” Ibsen said.
A stroll through the gallery begins in a small retail shop, winds through racks of waiting orders, a well-appointed workroom, and down some stairs into the heart of the collection. Whether you need a simple pair of tap dance shorts or a lavish Dickens ensemble, it’s no accident you’ll find it at Ibsen’s.
Kindra Foster reports from Lincoln, Nebraska.
Kindra Foster
Kindra Foster is a professional freelance writer and editor. Her services include marcom substitute writing and travel writing. For more about Kindra, visit her professional writing website and her travel chronicle, Roadworkwriter.
