Tahra Zafar

Tahra studied Theatre Design at Central St Martins. With over 25 years of experience, she runs a Creature and Costume Effects business, Tahra Zafar LTD, bringing together teams of freelancers and businesses for project specific collaboration.

Working across the creative genres of theatre, live events, film and television, Tahra creates creatures, characters, space costumes, aliens, giants, animals, puppets and costumes for worldwide productions and clients.

For the London Olympic and Paralympic Opening and Closing Ceremonies 2012, Tahra Headed up the Costume, Hair and Make-up department, overseeing the manufacturing of 23,000 costumes for the four events.

Known for designing, supervising and building, projects include:
Theatre costume and character design: In the Night Garden live, Bing Live.
Theatre design: Eugene Onegin, costume design (English National Opera), La Boheme and Rigoletto (Mid Wales Opera) and Roosters (The Bush Theatre).
Live event costume design and project supervision: Opening Ceremonies in Doha, Azerbaijan, Mauritius and Germany, including two Opening and Closing Ceremonies for the Commonwealth Games - in Manchester in 2002 and Birmingham 2022.

Film: Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens, Annihilation, X Men -First Class, Kick Ass, Hell Boy 2, The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Lost in Space and The Fifth Element.
TV: In the Night Garden, Moon & Me, The Adventures of Abney and Teal and Zingzillas.

Regularly collaborating with Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, Tahra built creations for Lady Gaga, The Scissor Sisters, Blur and created the infamous knitted puppet, Monkey, for ITV Digitals advertising campaign.

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