Holiday On Ice!

I've been seeing these signs all over Berlin since we first arrived in December.  They are plastered to the sides of buildings, they are glued to advertising poles, they are even stuck up on the windows in the U-Bahn!  Holiday On Ice: Passion is touring Europe and in Berlin from February to March.  

Here comes the cool part...

...my cousin, Cindy, designed ALL of the costumes for the show.  Yup!  She is an incredible artist and designs costumes worldwide!  As a matter of fact, she was just in Japan a few weeks ago finalizing her designs for a major event in Osaka. 

She hooked us up big time to see Holiday on Ice!  Ultimate date night!  

The show was at this incredible venue that looked like a giant circus tent. 

We walked by the tour truck on the way in with one of her other designs featured right in the middle!

Cindy got us awesome seats right in the middle of the area!

Super pumped for the show to begin!

To quote the Holiday On Ice website, "The new Passion show pulls back the backstage curtain and shows you the life of the skaters from the first steps on the ice to the world of the beauty, ambition and glamorous elements that skaters experience.  The show follows the true-life stories of the cast members culminating in an explosive representation of Generation Now."

The opening number was one of my favorites because it featured Cindy's Steampunk costumes!!! 

Cindy tasked me with photographing the Moroccan costumes in the second act since Holiday On Ice didn't send her any photos of these costumes. 

In addition to Cindy's gorgeous costumes, they also hung Moroccan-inspired streamers from the ceiling and had a complete aerial ballet scene!

Cindy's Peacock costume was definitely my favorite! 

I also like Purple Spider Girl behind Peacock. 

The new-age laser light skating scene was awesome!

The grand finale took the cake with elaborate feathered wings!

Totally incredible!  The crowd went crazy for this girl!  It was so cool to be there and see Cindy's beautiful designs skating across the stage!

But the magic continued when Fritz and I met Andrei! 

Andrei is Cindy's manager who travels with the show.  He has the huge task of taking care of all the costumes as they bounce from city to city.  He met us after the show and took us for our very own backstage tour!!  

Cindy connected us as she and Andrei have become good pals over the years of working together on design projects.  She shared a memory from when she and Andrei stayed up chatting through the night as they frantically sewed on feathers and beads before an opening performance.  It's easy to see why Cindy likes Andrei so much... he's the friendliest person ever!  He was so hospitable and let me take pictures to my heart's delight behind the scenes! 

We started in his sewing room while the skaters were all changing after the show.  You can see one of the Steampunk corsets needed a few repairs.  

Here is the Peacock crown.

Andrei showed us shelves full of hats, headpieces, props and more!

Fritz modeled one of the Steampunk headpieces.  Check out those details!

Andrei let us pose on the jumbo vanity from the showgirl scene.  You can see his reflection in the mirror to my left. 

Here is Andrei center-stage with the theater seats behind him. 

He actually let me try on the show-stopper wings!!!!  I couldn't believe it!  I thought he was asking me, "Do you have a tripod?" (like for my camera), but he really said, "Do you want to try them on?"

Um... YES!!!  

So special!  A huge thank you to Andrei and Cindy for hooking us up with a terrific date night!  It was incredible to watch Cindy's creative genius dance across the ice!  Thank you for sharing it with us!  What a talented cousin I have!