"Wakanda Forever !"Already breaking records before its official release, Black Panther is bound to make a big splash at the box office. And while Marvel fans are eagerly waiting to lay eyes on the latest blockbuster from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spotern reached out to Ruth E. Carter, the mastermind behind the fabulous costumes of the movie.With more than 40 films and tv series on her resume, the longtime Spike Lee collaborator (Do The Right Thing, Jungle Fever, Chi-Raq) was, interestingly enough, very new to the superhero genre. A surprinsing fact giving the realism and  the detailed work she brought to Black Panther's costumes. From T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman)'s refined shirts, to the Dora Milaje's uniforms, or the innovative garment of Queen Mother Ramonda (Angela Bassett) and genius Princess Shuri (Letitia Wright), we dove into the world of Wakanda and spoke career, innovative designs and African inspirations with costume designer Ruth E. Carter.

How did you become a costume designer ?

Ruth E. Carter : I started in college, and I was an acting major in the theater department. I didn’t make the audition for a play and the professor who was directing the piece asked me if I wanted to do the costumes. I said yes because I had some experience in my childhood with teaching myself how to saw on my mom’s old sewing machine. I felt comfortable with creating things, so I went ahead and did the costumes for this play which was Molière’s Would Be Gentleman. We modernised the piece and  I was able to simply create some looks for that play and then from there I was known on campus as the costume designer.

Where did you get your start as a costume designer ?

I started to pursue my career not only from taking charge of every theater pre-production that was done on campus, but also seeking out opportunities in local theaters. I did internships after I graduated, one at the Santa Fe Opera and in New Mexico. And since I was kinda in the west or in the midwest, my family invited me to come to Los Angeles. I came out really to pursue theater because that’s what I knew. And there was not a lot of theaters as most peuple know, in Los Angeles. So I signed out wherever I could whether it’d be à dance theater or a live theater.And it just so happens  that Spike Lee came to see a performance that I had done the costume for. And we all were very young, and Spike Lee was not really a famous person yet. So it was more like a group of young people hanging out and having a good time.And shortly after that he asked me to design School Daze which was his first studio picture. It’s kind of the only job I’ve ever known. That relationship continued with Spike Lee for 25 years. And from that other opportunities were created. After doing Malcom X with Spike Lee, I was asked to do movies with other directors, wich kind put me into the Hollywood framework a little bit more.

How did you come across Black Panther ?

I was told by my agent. I really didn’t know that they were getting ready to do the Black Panther film. She told me and then she told me that they had an interest meeting with me. They sent me some pages from some comics that were telling the story of the Black Panther, Ulysses Klaw and how he lost his arm, vibranium… They also sent me some verbiage about Wakanda. I was thinking “Oh my God what the heck is this?” You know I grew up with my brother loving superhero comics, but I was a girl who read Archies.It was a new world for me so I called a bunch of friends and they kind of gave me a crash course and I begin to put together images for my interview. I interviewed with Ryan Coogler and Nate Moore (the movie's producer) over at Marvel and I had a wonderful conversation with Ryan, I liked him immediately. And maybe a month later I was on a movie who just so happens to be with Chadwick Boseman (Marshall) and it was directed by Reginald Hudlin who had done one of the big Black Panther comic book. So he was directing and Chadwick was staring and I felt so honored to be in the position that I was in.

What did you pull from the comics to create the world of Wakanda ?

Well the comics really showed me that the world of the Black Panther was painted within the confines of the continent of Africa. And when I looked at the people of Wakanda in the comics, I saw all kinds of influences. I saw someone with a Maasai headdress, I saw kufis (african cap) and geles (nigerian head wrap) and dreadlocks. I saw modern dresses and technology infused into the costumes. But everything was very general. In comics I think that they paint things in a specific way that gives you the idea but doesn’t necessarily gives you a lot of the specifics. So once I saw that kind of thing over and over, I realized that this was a new world for us to create. That the technology that was drawn in the comics was already obsolete and that we could bring something brand new to the table. And I felt that’s what Ryan Coogler was communicating to me as well.

When he's not fighting in his Black Panther suit, T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman) wears detailed monochromatic looks, can you tell us a bit more about his clothes ?

Everything that he wore, except for the hoodie during the CIA interrogation sequence, is custom made. And it was that way because we were in a fictitious place that was based on the African continent. He is a Prince, a King now, that means he has a feeling of royalty but also uniqueness.We embroidered all the collars, all the embroideries was of course all custom made. The suit he wears walking to the Wakandan Design Group, all custom done. And that was purposeful so that we could examine ways so that we could present him in a manner that was completely unique to him.

Another character with a very unique style is Queen Mother Ramonda (Angela Bassett). We are in love with her headpieces and her architectural white dress. How did you create her look ?

Ramonda’s silhouette I felt needed to be that of a queen in a way that we know one in our minds and in our fantasies. That means that she wears à crown that she wears à shoulder mantle, that she has a big dress and she is a big presence.And so I found out about a woman in UCLA named Julia who was leading the way with this new technology where you could actually 3D print clothing. And I was interested in this because I felt that Ramonda’s headpiece, which is patterned from the Zulu women’s hat, needed to be a perfect cylindrical shape. If a queen were to wear anything it would be made by very specialised craft people. And since Wakanda was a forward nation, that had advanced technology, I felt her crown needed to reflect that.

So I contacted Julia at UCLA and I asked her to come into my office and explain to me how 3D printing worked with regards to clothing. And she did and we created the Zulu hat with an algorithm that Julia worked on the computer with. We created the shoulder mantle based on patterns of african lace that I gave her. She then made the 3D model that we then sent to a special printer in Belgium that was able to use this material that was semi-flexible. The printer was large enough to print large pieces that could be used for clothing.Julia also explained to me that this process took about six month. And we only had six months to create the full world of Wakanda so I had to work really fast to get her my inspirations and my ideas so that she could begin her work and then fly to Belgium to oversee the printing of the pieces.

T'Challa is often accompagnied by Okoye (Danai Gurira) the general of his army and Nakia (Lupita Nyong'o), a spy in charge of collecting intel on other nations. Reunited during the casino scene, they both wear beautiful dresses. What went into creating those pieces?

The dresses of Nakia and Okoye were both custom made. For Okoye, we wanted the dress to blow quite dynamically like flames, so it was created with several layers in the skirt, but then as we worked on it, we didn’t want all of the bulk of these three layers to just sort of robb the beauty in the latest work that we did in the upper part of the body. So I had a dress maker from the ballet who knew how to work with this type of light flowy fabric and she was able to create the red dress, and gave it six layers of skirt underneath so that when we do see her flying on top of this car, this skirt is flying behind her.

Nakia’s green dress is made in the same vein as the Panther’s superhero suit. It is made in the same way, with the same fabric, the same give and stretch, and also it has two slits up the front so that when she finally does engage into the fighting, she’s able to move. The print was inspired by Kente cloth. Basically we put the line work of Kente Cloth and used it as a simple print, and we printed the fabric with the euro jersey, the same fabric that we used to print the Panther Suit. The printing is raised, it’s a cold supplemental printing so it has a 3D quality to it. Then we hand-painted it with green color, because green is Nakia’s color from her tribe, and we hand-painted it with an ombre effect on top. So she walks into the casino as an african princess, somewhat undercover.

Nakia and Okoye are part of the Dora Milaje (The Adored Ones in Wakandan) the elite military force of Wakanda, in charge of protecting the King and the Kingdom's interests. What was your inspiration for their look and how did you put their costumes together ?

The Dora Milaje uniform needed to embody the culture of Wakanda in the same way that a samuraï suit would embody the asian culture of Japan. And I wanted to create it in such a way it could be something that a Dora Milaje fighter when she retire, could pass down to her daughter and her granddaughter. So the color was inspired by the Maasai tribe and many tribes around Africa that use the ochre and the red color to paint their bodies completely. The red was enhanced and made really vibrant so that it was somewhat intimidating. Like when you see four Dora Milaje standing together it feels like 10 because they’re so brilliant and so bright.

The armour we had hand-crafted by a jewelry designer because I wanted the armor to feel like jewelry. When we plated it, we plated it with a really bright tone to it so it had this shimmer. Because they are the highest ranking fighting force, they protect the king, and I feel like when a woman reaches this level of artistry within her fighting ability, she’s presented with a costume,or a uniform that is specifically made for her, and it’s an honour to receive such a uniform. So I felt that the uniform needed to look like it was on a royal level. So I imagine there would be craft people that would be responsible for every detail and that the strapping that goes around the costume, the brown leather roping or belting I use as my example the belting that we had made in South Africa on an other job, where we had these crafts-men who were hand-tooling these belts, so those belts I presented to the work room that was tooling these leather work that kind of strapped around their bodies. I call it their harness.And attached to this harness is the beaded tabards and since beads are a big part of the African culture, bead work is signififcant in so many ways for Africa, I decided that the bead work in the front of the tabard should be african beads. And they are real african beads that I needed to lacen with vibranium to make them extra special, to create another hand-done element to it to make it look like it could be handed down. I also put towards the bottom the three trinkets that I felt each wearer could customize with something that she could feel protected by, whether it’s a piece of jade or a piece of amethyst, or an african doll or symbol that would represent where she was from.

Although she is T'Challa's little sister, and therefore Wakanda's princess, Shuri (Letitia Wright)'s look seem to diverge from the classic wakandan look, was it a conscious choice ?

Shuri as you’ll see in the story is bored with tradition. She doesn’t wanna wear the traditional costumes in the opening of the film and that informs her costume for when she was in the Wakandan Design Group. So I was inspired by Stella McCartney who I read somewhere that she was working on fabrics where she could use recycled material. So I thought that Shuri would definitely be someone with a fabric that would be considered forward, that she wouldn’t wear a traditional lab costume. Possibly if I use something like mesh and created an overlay, she would look like she had a special fabric that protect her clothing and her body without it being something western like a lab coat. So all of her costumes were custom made.

Compared to the other characters on screen, Erik Killmonger seems, look wise, the most connected to the western world, can you expand on that ?

Erik Killlmonger is considered a part of the lost tribe because his father exiled himself from Wakanda and raised him in Oakland. So Erik Killlmonger is still heir to the throne because he is a royal blood, but he has grown up and been educated in America. So he is this special character that I feel is very relatable to pop culture. Because he wears drop pouch pants and a jean jacket. He has his hair in dreadlocks. But there’s a little twist to his look. He has these high glasses that give him a smart look. He has this ponytail on the top of his head. It makes you curious about him.

And Erik Killmonger is someone that I didn’t know very much about in the comics and I was told that the character was not very much developed in the comics but the way Michael B. Jordan has portrayed him has giving him more of a story. So with his costume we tried to make him unapologetic, able to actually wear the palpable line between pop culture and hip hop clothing. But you wouldn’t know that it cost what it did by just looking at him. He looks like he could fit right in at any club that any young person might wanna go. And yet he’s wakandan, he’s royal , he’s educated at M.I.T and he also possesses this power and knowledge about vibranium. All of his costumes except for his civilian suits were custom-made, his metal vest is custom-made but I bought everything else, I bought his sweater, I bought his jean jacket, I bought his Balmain boots, his drop pouch pants, I bought his t-shirt, his camel pants. He is of that culture in America where you can buy your clothes and that’s what separated him from T’Challa.

Small and discrete, The Kimoyo beads were everywhere in Black Panther. From emergency calls to remote control functionalities, wakandans use them for everything. Did you design this inescapable artifact of wakandan culture?No, we all tried to get our own beads and designs for the Kimoyo beads. Every department had some type of beads that they presented. But it was the production designer Hannah Beachler (Moonlight, Lemonade) who designed the Kimoyo beads.

What’s next for you ?

I’m supposed to do Silver Sable & Black Cat. That’s another movie with two women characters from the Marvel Universe but it’s produced by Sony Pictures.

Will you try out more superhero movies in the future ?

Yes but as long as I can be creative, you know sometimes when you take on something that’s already established it’s not as creative an envrionment as the Black Panther was. I’d like to actually do the next Black Panther so I could develop further some of the work that I started.

Black Panther hits theaters Friday 16th 2018.