🔗 Share this article

After a 31-year stint on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the dancers from the production Jubilee! gave one last synchronised kick in 2016. The extravaganza, renowned for its intricate costumes designed by style icon Bob Mackie, closed its doors due to declining audience numbers and disappointed reviewers who called it a spectacle “stuck in the past”.

Now, roughly eight years later, showgirls, or at least the showgirl style, is experiencing a revival.

The Sultan of Sparkle

Known as the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made theatrical showgirl glitz his defining aesthetic, clothing everyone from Marilyn Monroe to music superstars. Recently, a “see-through” bodysuit he made for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, seven times its estimated price, while a shimmering fringed bodysuit with reflective wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.

“I believe it looks more enticing for the new generation of stars who is desiring something other than what they were accustomed to”, he explained to a newspaper. “New stars are pushing toward a glamorous, more theatrical, breathtaking, entrance-making statement.”

The Musical Comeback

It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the centre of the cultural zeitgeist in 2025 largely due to Taylor Swift. In the past few months, the cultural juggernaut wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her 12th studio album. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, plumed armbands and glittering headpiece were tailor-made for a record titled The Life of a Showgirl.

The singer is part of a trend. This year, showgirl references have been adopted by music artists including Sabrina Carpenter as they whizzed across arena stages in glitter, cut-outs and feathers, spotlighted against theatrical sets. A top stylist Lorenzo Posocco told a style publication he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 50s, her performers waved giant plumed accessories.

Pulling from Tradition

These artists and other successful musicians also take inspiration from classic entertainment forms, including classic theater and dance line references. The final look are vastly different from the 1990s era teen pop of short shirts and cargo pants, and hip-hop inspired dance moves that preceded this trend.

But certain observers are enthusiastic with this showgirl renaissance. Nancy Hardy, a one-time Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the early 2000s says the trend is “puzzling”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “used as an umbrella term including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now apparently modern pop stars.”

A Highly Sought-After Retro Look

For millennial and millennial stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become incredibly sought-after. In 2024, a style icon honored to one of Mackie’s iconic muses, Cher, when the star wore a translucent sequined dress created by the designer in 2001, which was reminiscent of one he designed for Cher to wear in 1967. Subsequently, a singer paid an undisclosed sum to buy the Mackie tasseled mini dress she had worn at an awards show to perform at the Grammys. In September, Sabrina Carpenter wore a trio of classic Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a favorite among vintage enthusiasts.

“The showgirl aesthetic inspire fond memories for a bygone era of glitz,” says an archivist, head of special collections at the a Las Vegas university, who studies the history of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘toned-down’ sexy because it has been updated. It has got all the sophistication, the crystals and the shine but without the exposure.”

More Than Just Fashion: An Symbol of Las Vegas

The expert says this figure are central to the iconography of Sin City. She points to one-time leader Oscar Goodman who, during official events, was surrounded by two showgirls. While Las Vegas does not host any showgirl-based productions, Jung says they are still featured as an symbol of the city, appearing at conventions and in promotional material. “The showgirl is still a enduring figure of Las Vegas glamour,” the expert says.

An Appeal of Escape

Nancy Hardy says the transformative effect of a showgirl persona is part of the appeal. It’s something the singer alludes to in a new behind-the-scenes film that shows the behind-the-scenes action from her year-long 2023 Eras tour, which included gruelling rehearsals, gym sessions and numerous concerts across dozens of cities, each running for 3.5 hours.

She explains her own nights in the spotlight as “similar to extreme physical exertion in stilettos every night”. Her headpiece tipped the scales at 34lbs. “I had to support it all the way up the stairs to the performance area from the dressing rooms three floors below in the lower level. I had to leave early for my entrance so I could rest before I made my entrance. One is perspiring the whole time but crafting this image that it’s effortless and gorgeous and ethereal.”

It could be this is where the fascination of the showgirl really resides. In the chaos of 2025 there is a craving for escapism. Who better to look to than showgirls, who have always represented fantasy, perfection and a universe where nobody misses a mark.