Creating Luxury Looks from Street Market Clothes with Vera Chow - The Season

Costume designer Vera Chow joins Voice of Costume for a fascinating conversation about Hulu's The Season—and how culture can completely change the meaning of what we wear. Growing up in Hong Kong before building a career across the U.S. and Asia gave Vera a unique understanding of the invisible rules behind clothing. She breaks down the difference between Hong Kong's British-influenced old money and flashier new money, why presentation carries different expectations there than in America, and how those cultural codes shaped the characters and visual world of The Season. Vera's explaning the difference between bullying in China vs the USA is worth the price of admission alone, much less the myriad of other cultural insights she shares about designing overseas and what a lot of other designers do not realize when they work there. Then Vera reveals one of the most unconventional design processes we've ever discussed on the show: instead of always building costumes from scratch, she often buys existing garments, cuts them apart, and rebuilds them into something completely new—a process she jokingly calls "Frankenstein." Cheap street-market finds, K-pop-inspired pieces, vintage Japanese fabrics and unexpected materials can all become costumes that look extraordinarily expensive on screen. She also shares how her experience on The Walking Dead led her to stunt training, why understanding local crews and resources matters when working internationally, and how costume design must balance beauty with movement, safety and story. This is a must-listen for fans of The Season, costume designers, filmmakers, fashion lovers, thrifters, Asian and Asian-American creatives, and anyone fascinated by how culture shapes the way we dress. It's one of the most unconventional approaches to costume design we've ever explored on Voice of Costume one every listener will be fascinated by.