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After a three-decade run on the iconic Vegas strip, the performers from the production Jubilee! took a final perfectly timed kick in 2016. The production, famous for its ornate costumes created by style icon Bob Mackie, closed its doors due to falling audience numbers and critical critics who labeled it a spectacle “a relic of another era”.

Now, almost a decade later, showgirls, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is back.

A Master of Sequins

Dubbed the “king of sparkle”, Mackie has made over-the-top showgirl glitz his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. Recently, a “naked” bodysuit he made for Cher in 1978 commanded $57,600, far exceeding its projected value, while a shimmering tasseled bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie crafted for Tina Turner for a 1977 show sold for $19,200.

“In my view it looks more attractive for the younger performer who is desiring something other than what they knew from childhood”, he told a media outlet. “Today's artists are embracing a show-stopping, more theatrical, breathtaking, grand statement.”

The Pop Culture Resurgence

It’s a look that sashayed all the way to the epicenter of the cultural zeitgeist in 2025 thanks to Taylor Swift. In the past few months, the entertainment titan wore one of Mackie’s classic Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her latest record. The bedazzled bra and thong, plumed armbands and glittering headpiece were ideal for a record called The Life of a Showgirl.

She has company. This year, glamorous nods have been incorporated by music artists including Sabrina Carpenter as they zoomed across arena stages in glitter, strategic openings and ostrich feathers, highlighted against theatrical sets. A top stylist Lorenzo Posocco mentioned in an interview with a style publication he wanted to bring “a stage persona” to her Radical Optimism tour – drawing from pictures from the 1950s, her performers waved giant feathered fans.

Drawing from the Past

Modern stars and other hitmakers also take inspiration from classic entertainment forms, including vaudeville and dance line references. The outcome are vastly different from the 90s Britney Spears era of revealing tops and cargo pants, and street-style dance moves that were popular earlier.

But some critics are convinced with this glamour resurgence. A former performer, a ex- Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the 2000s says the trend is “puzzling”. She thinks the word showgirl is being “employed as an broad label including everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now seemingly modern pop stars.”

A Highly Sought-After Classic Look

For millennial and young adult stars, Mackie’s vintage designs have become extremely desirable. In 2024, a style icon gave a nod to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the actress wore a translucent sequined dress created by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, a singer paid an undisclosed sum to buy the Mackie fringed mini dress she had worn earlier in the year to perform at the Grammys. In September, Sabrina Carpenter wore a collection of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a popular item among vintage enthusiasts.

“This style inspire nostalgia for a historical elegance,” says an archivist, head of special collections at the a Las Vegas university, who researches the story of showgirls. “Now it is considered a sort of ‘toned-down’ sexy because it has been adapted. It has got all the sophistication, the sparkles and the glitter but without the nudity.”

More Than Just Style: An Icon of the City

The expert says the showgirl image are key to the imagery of Vegas. She points to former mayor Oscar Goodman who, during civic functions, was surrounded by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas currently lacks any showgirl-centric productions, Chung says they are still featured as an logo of the city, showing up at gatherings and in advertisements. “The showgirl is still a remaining symbol of Las Vegas glamour,” she says.

An Allure of Transformation

Nancy Hardy says the complete change of a stage character is part of the allure. This is a notion the singer references in a new behind-the-scenes film that shows the off-camera action from her massive 2023 Eras tour, which included intense rehearsals, workouts and countless shows across multiple nations, each going on for 3.5 hours.

Hardy explains her own stage routines as “comparable to completing an endurance race in heels every night”. Her feathered headdress was 34lbs. “I had to wear it all the way up the stairs to the platform from the dressing rooms three floors below in the basement. I had to start early for my moment so I could rest before I performed. One is sweating the whole time but crafting this fantasy that it’s effortless and gorgeous and dreamlike.”

Perhaps this is where the true allure of the showgirl fantasy really resides. In the complexity of 2025 there is a desire for escapism. Is there anyone better to turn to than such icons, who have always represented fantasy, perfection and a realm where no one falters.