🔗 Share this article

Following a long-running run on the iconic Vegas strip, the performers from the revue Jubilee! gave one last perfectly timed kick in 2016. The show, known for its intricate costumes created by style icon Bob Mackie, came to an end due to declining audience numbers and critical critics who called it a spectacle “a relic of another era”.

Now, nearly ten years later, the showgirl, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is making a comeback.

The Sultan of Sparkle

Known as the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made dramatic showgirl glitz his defining aesthetic, clothing everyone from Marilyn Monroe to Madonna. Recently, a “see-through” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, seven times its initial estimate, while a metallic beaded bodysuit with lamé wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.

“I think it looks more attractive for the emerging artists who is desiring something other than what they were accustomed to”, he told a media outlet. “Contemporary performers are embracing a glamorous, more spectacular, attention-grabbing, entrance-making statement.”

A Mainstream Resurgence

It’s a look that glided all the way to the centre of the cultural zeitgeist in 2025 propelled by a chart-topping superstar. Recently, the music phenomenon wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her new musical project. The rhinestone encrusted bra and thong, feathered armbands and sparkly headpiece were ideal for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.

The singer isn't alone. This year, showgirl inspirations have been incorporated by pop stars including Sabrina Carpenter as they danced across arena stages in sparkles, revealing designs and feathers, highlighted against theatrical sets. A top stylist Lorenzo Posocco mentioned in an interview with a style publication he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the mid-century, her performers fluttered giant plumed accessories.

Pulling from the Past

These artists and other successful musicians also take inspiration from 19th-century performances, including burlesque and ensemble references. The results are vastly different from the 90s teen pop of crop tops and utilitarian trousers, and street-style dance moves that came before them.

But certain observers are on board with this showgirl revival. An ex-showgirl, a ex- Jubilee! showgirl who entertained in the early 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “employed as an umbrella term covering everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now seemingly today's icons.”

A Highly Sought-After Classic Style

For younger and young adult stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a style icon gave a nod to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actress wore a semi-sheer sequined dress created by the designer in 2001, which was inspired by one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, a singer paid an significant price to buy the Mackie fringed mini dress she had worn previously to perform at the Grammys. In September, Carpenter wore a collection of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among vintage enthusiasts.

“Showgirls bring about nostalgia for a past glamour,” says Su Kim Chung, an expert at the an academic institution, who studies the story of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘acceptable’ appeal because it has been modified. It has got all the elegance, the rhinestones and the glitter but without the exposure.”

A Than Just Fashion: An Icon of Las Vegas

Chung says this figure are central to the imagery of Las Vegas. She points to ex-mayor Oscar Goodman who, during official events, was surrounded by two showgirls. While Las Vegas does not host any traditional showgirl productions, Chung says they are still employed as an symbol of the city, showing up at corporate events and in advertisements. “The showgirl is still a lasting figure of Vegas spectacle,” Chung says.

The Appeal of Illusion

The former showgirl says the complete change of a showgirl persona is part of the allure. This is a notion Taylor Swift alludes to in a latest behind-the-scenes film that documents the backstage action from her year-long 2023 Eras tour, which included gruelling preparations, gym sessions and countless shows across dozens of cities, each lasting 3.5 hours.

She recalls her own stage routines as “similar to extreme physical exertion in stilettos every night”. Her feathered headdress weighed 34lbs. “I had to carry it all the way up the staircase to the performance area from the dressing rooms three floors below in the lower level. I had to head up ahead of time for my entrance so I could recover before I made my entrance. You are perspiring the whole time but crafting this illusion that it’s easy and beautiful and dreamlike.”

Perhaps this is where the fascination of the showgirl fantasy really lies. In the busyness of 2025 there is a craving for a break from reality. Who better to emulate than these performers, who have always embodied fantasy, idealism and a universe where no one makes a mistake.