Dede Ayite – Photo news.lehigh.edu
Dede Ayite is a Tony Award-winning costume designer in theater, opera, and film known for her dramatic storytelling through costume design. Ayite’s Off-Broadway credits include “Secret Life of Bees,” “Fireflies,” and many other productions.
Dede has worked on over 23 different Broadway production plays, including “Othello”, “Slave Play,” “Hell’s Kitchen,” “Children of a Lesser God,” and “Our Town,” for which she recently won the 2025 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Costume for a Play. Dede was nominated for, and has won, distinguished awards several times. Last year, Ayite made history as the first Black woman to win a Tony Award for Best Costume Design of a Play.
Dede Ayite, with her Tony Award, Photo by Theo for Getty Images
She won the award in 2024 for her work on “Jaja’s African Hair Braiding”, a play set in a Harlem hair salon. This year, she is nominated for her work on “Buena Vista Social Club”.
“Part of what I do as a costume designer comes out of my fascination for what it means to be a human being; what makes us ‘us’ and why we do the things we do” – Dede Ayite
Dede Ayite and Sandy Schreier – Photo by Marilyn Kirschner
I met Dede when she attended the Superfine: Tailoring Black Style press preview at the Met’s Costume Institute, with Sandy Schreier, who was featured in her major exhibition, “In Pursuit of Fashion: The Sandy Schreier Collection”, November 27, 2019 – September 27, 2020. Dede and Sandy initially bonded over their shared love of theatre, fashion, and clothes.
Dede knows that great fashion lifts you into another dimension. She understands how transformative fashion can be; it instantly changes how you look and feel about yourself. This is why Dede loves costume design. She gets to create that magic for others. Dede used to dream of being a fashion designer; with theater design, she gets to fuse storytelling, fashion, and costume design.
A resident of New York for 14 years, Dede grew up in Ghana. “Part of the culture in Ghana is always looking your best at all times when you’re leaving the house,” says Dede, who always gravitated to clothes and reveled in the joy of just wanting to put on your best look. As a young girl, Dede often sketched her clothes, had them made, and frequently hung out with the seamstresses in their shops.
Dede Ayite wears Rick Owens for the opening night of Hell’s Kitchen – Photo courtesy Dede Ayite Instagram.
Dede admits that she can look at a piece of clothing and feel a sense of happiness in her heart almost immediately. She gravitates to designers like Rick Owens for his sculptural designs and Schiaparelli and Alexander McQueen for their impeccable craftsmanship and imagination.
In the past two years, when Dede attended the Tony Awards as a nominee, she designed her dress and had it custom-made by John Kristensen Studios. Ayite loves the idea of honoring her heritage and culture, so this year, she reached out to Ghana-based Pistis, pistisghana.com, to custom-design a gown made of Kente, the Ghanaian textile made of hand-woven strips of silk and cotton.
Dede likens the process of creating costumes to going on a scavenger hunt. For the Buena Vista Social Club, Dede examined vintage fashion from the 1940s through the 1960s and the 1990s, poring over images and videos from Cuba spanning the period from the 1940s to the present day, to create a cohesive story for costuming.
With the help of a great team, Dede sourced everywhere, New York and beyond. Sometimes Ayite will find a garment and add her details or embroidery to make it look the way she wants it to. She will mold her findings to fit the story.
Dede Ayite’s costumes for Hell’s Kitchen – Photo courtesy Dede Ayite Instagram
Dede has a great eye, but she does not do the tailoring and draping herself. Instead, Dede collaborates with the premier custom costume shops located in the garment district. “We want to keep them alive because what they bring to the ecosystem is invaluable,” says Dede, who draws inspiration from fabrics and research, helping her bring these pieces to life.
Dee Ayite Instagram
Among the theatrical costume supply shops Dede relied on for Buena Vista Social Club are Eric Winterling, Inc., John Kristiansen Studio, Bethany Joy, and Jennifer Love. In addition, Dede often depends on custom professional hand painter Hochi Asiatico’s meticulously prepared theatrical fabrics and distressing services.
Hochi hand-paints pieces and professionally distresses clothes to give them a more lived-in look. “Performers bring the garments to life, but Hochi can paint that life into the garment,” observes Dede.
Jake Gyllenhaal as Lago and Denzel Washington as Othello in ‘Othello’ on Broadway – Photo by Sara Krulwich for The New York Times
As for the arduous creative process? The script provides Ayite with the necessary information. She listens to music to help inspire her, and then she starts researching to get an idea of what the real clothes look like. One of Ayite’s favorite aspects of her work is the research, which involves exploring the world of the play she is working on.
Dede Ayite, Photo by @angela.marie.photo
Ayite has a “ton of books” (vintage books, a book of costumes, and an encyclopedia of men’s fashion showing the original designs), which she always references to ensure she gets the proper structure, the correct shoulder lines, and so on. In this way, Dede can blend the reality of the story with the actual appearance of the garments. This is crucial to the detail-oriented designer.
Dede has made costume design her life’s work for the last 18 – 20 years. She graduated from Lehigh University with a major in behavioral neuroscience and a minor in theater. Dede received her MFA from the Yale School of Drama, where her love of theatrical costume design flourished.
I asked Ayite if there was any project she would love to work on, something she had been dreaming about. “I’ve always loved ‘Game of Thrones’. The costuming is spectacular. Of course, it’s been done, but I would love to have my own “Game of Thrones”, whatever that might look like. To be able to tell a story in such a beautiful, expansive, and fantastical way would be a dream.”
