As the world of Lalovavi expands, so does the artistry that shapes it. Few elements reveal a story’s soul as clearly as its costumes, and in a work set 400 years into the future—where the city of Atlas rises from ancestral memory and Afrofuturist vision—clothing becomes more than what characters wear. It becomes the archive they carry, the history they embody, and the possibilities they dare to imagine.
To bring this future into view, Cincinnati Opera turned to someone who understands costume design as world-building: Kara Harmon.
Kara Harmon
Lalovavi Costume Designer
THE WORLDMAKER BEHIND THE WARDROBE
Harmon’s path to becoming one of the field’s most sought-after designers has been shaped by a lifelong fascination with how clothing moves, speaks, and transforms. A graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, she has built an expansive career across Broadway, regional theatre, opera, and film—creating work known for its emotional clarity and visual poetry.
What distinguishes Harmon is her deep dramaturgical approach. She doesn’t simply design garments; she studies characters the way a writer studies narrative, uncovering what they fear, hope, inherit, and dream. Her designs honor lived experience—both real and imagined—and she infuses each piece with cultural memory, specificity, and soul.
CRAFTING CHARACTERS THROUGH FORM AND FABRIC
Harmon’s work pays exquisite attention to silhouette, structure, and texture—elements that reveal a character’s inner life as surely as their words. Across her portfolio, Harmon blends cultural lineage with bold invention, creating designs that feel rooted yet expansive. That same sensibility guides her vision for Lalovavi.
DESIGNING A FUTURE BORN FROM MEMORY
Atlas—Lalovavi’s Afrofuturist city—is not a fantasy untouched by the past. In Harmon’s hands, it becomes a place where ancestral echoes meet visionary possibility. She imagines a future built from materials shaped by heritage, adaptive technologies, ritual symbolism, and the resilience of a community that has forged its own cosmology.
Rather than pulling from a single era or aesthetic, Harmon constructs a collage of influences: diasporic visual languages, organic shapes, celestial textures, and geometric forms that suggest both tradition and transcendence. The result is a style that feels ancient and futuristic at once—a visual continuum from what was to what might yet be.
WHAT COSTUMES REVEAL ABOUT LIFE IN ATLAS
Early sketches explore how each group, guild, and community expresses its identity through dress:
TITAN
The patriarch of the Musan family and supreme ruler of Atlas, Titan wears the beautifully brutal authority of Atlas. Sharp silhouettes, dark metals, and structured fabrics signal sovereignty and control, radiating a presence that is both magnificent and fearsome.
PERSEPHONE
Daughter of the Musan family, Persephone begins draped in Atlas’s rigid, royal authority. When the Tree-of-Life gene is revealed, she flees, and her garments fracture and soften, shedding the severity of her upbringing. In embracing her Nunewaks heritage, her attire transforms into flowing, luminous fabrics fused with ceremonial armor and subtle healing technologies, reflecting both her lineage and the authoritative brilliance she now commands.
ZIPPORAH
The oldest Musan daughter, Zipporah mirrors the family’s formidable elegance. Her costumes combine sharp structure with glinting ornamentation, signaling both status and youthful cunning. While less imposing than Titan, her attire still carries the weight of the Musan legacy, blending beauty and command in every detail.
NUNEWAKS WARRIORS
Healers and warriors whose garments fuse protection, ceremony, and the subtle radiance of healing technologies. Their attire blends ancestral patterns with luminous circuitry, creating a look that is sacred, formidable, and full of authoritative presence.
These looks are not decorative; they are cultural frameworks. They show how the people of Atlas live, work, gather, and imagine themselves into the future.
Behind the Seams: The Process
For Lalovavi, Harmon’s process unfolds like an archaeological dig and an act of prophecy simultaneously. It includes:
In-depth character studies and dramaturgical research
World-building sessions with the creative team to define histories, rituals, and technologies
Movement explorations to ensure costumes enhance physical storytelling
Texture and palette experimentation tied to emotional tone
Intentional integration of Afrofuturist principles that center authenticity and avoid cliché
Each garment becomes a piece of wearable architecture—an extension of the opera’s mythology and a testament to the characters who inhabit it.
Building the Future Together
Kara Harmon’s costume design is one chapter in a larger creative story—one that uplifts Black imagination, ancestral knowledge, and the power of artistic collaboration. Your partnership helps bring this visionary world to life.
We invite you to journey with us as Lalovavi continues to take shape and rise from imagination into reality.
Help bring Lalovavi to the stage.