For the current’s not too way back achieved second season, “Dwelling of the Dragon” costume designer Caroline McCall constructed on Season 1, using rich supplies and color palettes that included variations of greens and blacks, taking best friends-turned-adversaries Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke) and Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) into completely totally different directions, clothes-wise. Season 1’s work by Jany Temines superior over the course of the season into extremely efficient statements as worn by Rhaenyra, whereas Alicent’s vitality slipped as she turned up in classically feminine medieval robes.

McCall notes that the supplies are heavier, further luxurious, with velvets and satins, and rich embroidery. The costumes moreover mirror the reality that inside the time interval when “Dwelling of the Dragon” unfolds, the native climate in King’s Landing, the place an entire lot of the movement takes place, is cooler than the King’s Landing of “Recreation of Thrones.” In spite of everything, a number of of her inspiration received right here from the story itself, as dictated by the break up between the warring factions of “Dwelling of the Dragon” — the Greens of the Hightowers and the Blacks of the Targaryens.

What have been your influences for Rhaenyra and Alicent along with the clothes in Season 1?

I checked out Westeros on this time interval, and checked out what Jany had completed in sequence one. My feeling was that King’s Landing and the Hightowers, they’ve been further type of conventional, medieval in kind and European. I beloved what Jany had completed with with the wedding robes for Rhaenyra and Daemon and the dragon keepers — like, one factor that belonged to outdated Valyria and the Valyrian custom. I believed that since Rhaenyra had moved to Dragonstone and is attempting to stipulate herself as an actual Targaryen queen, that she would lean into her Targaryen heritage. So then I moreover checked out [“Game of Thrones” costume designer] Michelle Clapton’s costumes for Daenerys, and rewatched “Recreation of Thrones,” pondering of Daenerys by the use of her attempting to reflect her true Targaryen heritage. I used components of points that featured in Daenerys’ costumes in Rhaenyra’s and Baela’s clothes to aim to create the sort of Targaryen aesthetic.

Alicent’s look has gone from tougher-looking supplies in Season 1, when she rose in vitality, to a softer look as Season 2 unfolds and she or he is pushed out of a spot of have an effect on.

The first outfit that she wears in Season 2 is extra sturdy, and in actuality, we now have been going to have little epaulets on her shoulders, nevertheless it felt an extreme quantity of. Nonetheless we’ve the chain linking her shoulders, and it’s her most pious, religious look, and the fabric is a very deep Hightower inexperienced. After which we really play with the tones of color, counting on what’s happening. So when she’s caught with Cole [Fabien Frankel], after which she has to hurriedly positioned on a robe, that robe is further of a teal color, on account of that’s further the true Alicent in these tones than the political face of her. So we play with these colors. If she’s being loyal, she’s further in these darkish Hightower colors, after which at totally different moments, she’s in further teal tones.

After which we moreover carried out with a language all through the embroidery. So this gown that she ends up carrying, the pattern on it’s dragons respiration fire at each other, which is Aegon and Aemond, her children, ending up on this battle with each other. After which one different gown’s embroidery is like tendrils of weeds and thorns — it’s to counsel the lure that she’s created, of her private creation.

What about her outfit inside the finale, when she has a secret meeting with Rhaenyra and she or he is hooded and coated up?

The two of them have been meant to represent their earlier selves, so that they’re within the an identical colors as they wore after we very first met them in Season 1 when Rhaenyra received right here off the dragon in a gray utilizing outfit and Alicent was in blue. Alicent is in a pale teal color when she rides out inside the woods [in Episode 7] — she’s in a far more pale outfit than the true Hightower inexperienced. It’s all in regards to the shedding of her facade of how she feels about her private offspring.

What about Rhaenyra’s evolution?

So we start inside the first three episodes with a silhouette that’s further according to with what she had in Season 1, with the softer shoulders and the fuller skirt, nevertheless then beneath she’s purchased her black mourning [fabric] I match with the collar. After which she’s purchased a pink dragon-scale costume as correctly. They’re primarily the an identical silhouette, nevertheless completely totally different supplies. And beneath, I’ve purchased a pleated sun-ray petticoat, which harks once more to — or harks forward to — Daenarys. When she comes once more from the Grand Sept [where she meets Alicent in Episode 3], the manufacturing wished a singular look. She’s modified her mindset, modified her look. So we go proper right into a further Targaryen look, and the hemline is raised. And he or she’s on a regular basis in boots. You don’t you don’t see them, primarily, nevertheless she’s on a regular basis in boots from then on, after which her appears are on a regular basis applicable for leaping on a dragon.

What’s the story behind the magnificent gown inside the finale, the place she’s web internet hosting the model new dragon riders?

The costume for the dinner was really very important for these new these new dragon riders — it says “I’m in price,” and so they’d have in no way been spherical that type of grandeur sooner than. So she’s really attempting to make a level with what she’s carrying. The epaulet-like shoulders actually really feel like cauldrons, or like armor, or dragon scales.

This interview has been edited and condensed.