Following a 31-year stint on the Las Vegas strip, the dancers from the revue Jubilee! executed their last choreographed kick in 2016. The extravaganza, renowned for its intricate costumes designed by American fashion designer Bob Mackie, closed its doors due to dwindling audience numbers and critical critics who called it a spectacle “trapped in time”.
Today, nearly ten years later, the showgirl, or at least the showgirl style, is back.
A Master of Glitz
Referred to as the “sultan of sequins”, Mackie has made theatrical showgirl glitz his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. In a recent auction, a “naked” bodysuit he designed for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, seven times its projected value, while a shimmering tasseled bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie created for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.
“I believe it looks more appealing for the new generation of stars who is looking for something other than what they knew from childhood”, he stated in an interview with a media outlet. “New stars are striving for a show-stopping, more spectacular, show-stopping, entrance-making statement.”
A Musical Comeback
It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the heart of mainstream fashion in 2025 propelled by Taylor Swift. Recently, the cultural juggernaut wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The crystal-covered bra and thong, ostrich-feather armbands and sparkly headpiece were ideal for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.
Swift is part of a trend. This year, showgirl inspirations have been incorporated by pop stars including Dua Lipa as they zoomed across world tours in sparkles, strategic openings and plumes, illuminated against overstated sets. A top stylist a fashion expert explained to a style publication he wanted to bring “a showgirl attitude” to her Radical Optimism tour – referencing pictures from the 1950s, her performers fluttered giant feathered fans.
Pulling from History
Lipa, Carpenter and other chart toppers also draw on classic entertainment forms, including burlesque and dance line references. The outcome are vastly different from the late-century Britney Spears era of short shirts and cargo pants, and urban dance moves that came before them.
But not everyone are convinced with this showgirl revival. A former performer, a one-time Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the 2000s says the trend is “confusing”. She thinks the word term is being “used as an catch-all phrase including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even today's icons.”
A Coveted Classic Look
For millennial and millennial stars, Mackie’s vintage designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a style icon gave a nod to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the star wore a translucent embellished dress created by the designer in 2001, which was reminiscent of one he made for Cher to wear in 1967. Later that year, another pop star paid an significant price to buy the Mackie fringed mini dress she had worn previously to perform at the Grammys. In September, Sabrina Carpenter wore a trio of retro Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among fashion collectors.
“This style inspire nostalgia for a historical elegance,” says a historian, a curator at the a Las Vegas university, who researches the legacy of showgirls. “Today it is seen as a sort of ‘acceptable’ appeal because it has been modified. It has got all the glamour, the crystals and the glitter but without the nudity.”
A Than Simply Style: An Icon of the City
She says the showgirl image are central to the identity of Las Vegas. She points to ex-mayor Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was surrounded by two showgirls. Even though Las Vegas currently lacks any traditional showgirl productions, the historian says they are still featured as an emblem of the city, appearing at corporate events and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a remaining icon of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” the expert says.
The Appeal of Escape
Nancy Hardy says the transformative effect of a showgirl is part of the allure. This idea Swift hints at in a latest behind-the-scenes film that documents the backstage action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included exhausting preparations, workouts and 149 performances across dozens of cities, each lasting 3.5 hours.
She explains her own stage routines as “comparable to running a marathon in high heels every night”. Her feathered headdress was 34lbs. “I had to wear it all the way up the stairs to the stage from the dressing rooms three floors below in the underground. I had to leave early for my moment so I could rest before I made my entrance. One is perspiring the whole time but maintaining this image that it’s easy and beautiful and dreamlike.”
Perhaps this is where the appeal of the showgirl fantasy really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a craving for a break from reality. Who better to turn to than showgirls, who have always embodied make-believe, perfection and a world where no one falters.