Taylor Swift designer faced last-minute panic over all-white Grammys look

Taylor Swift's designer pal Marina Toybina faced a last-minute panic before the Grammy Awards on Sunday (10Feb13) when production designers at the ceremony told her she needed to age her bright white circus costumes for the show.

The stylist and her team spent weeks creating the 1930s circus look for the opening of music's big night in Los Angeles and had only just starched the handmade costumes for Swift and her 30 dancers, circus performers and band when the call came in from the show's creative director.

Toybina tells WENN, "Three days before the show every costume that was made was starched white... and then, probably 48 hours prior, we got a call that a lot of pieces had to be ivory and have a vintage feel to them because of the staging and lighting, so we had to dye all of the costumes so they'd be the opposite of what Taylor would be wearing.

"We had to figure out different ways to manipulate fabric and create that ageing process without knowing how the fabric would change or what might happen if we dyed all the trims again. That was our last-minute panic attack but it turned out beautifully.

"Once the creative director and the production were able to set up the stage and see the lighting, that's when the concern came in that there was too much white. You have to consider all the elements of production in order for the wardrobe to play a big role and play it correctly. It might have been too much and there would be an opportunity to lose Taylor onstage, so we kept her all white and then aged all the dancers."

Toybina reveals she turned to Google for dying tips: "We came up with different ways and Googled a lot of ideas and then we pulled off an all-nighter and dyed everything in my studio and then just kept our fingers crossed."

But the designer needn't have worried - her "whimsical, Tim Burton-inspired" old-school circus costumes were a big hit and Swift is now planning to incorporate her top-hatted ringleader look on her upcoming tour, which Toybina is also creating outfits for.