Costume order your clothes before you arrive. A guessed measurement means an outfit that does not fit, sorted out at 6am with a queue behind you.
Before you start. Use a soft tape measure. Measure over underwear or close-fitting clothes. Keep the tape level and snug enough to touch you without pulling in. Stand normally and breathe out. Get someone to help if you can – reaching round your own back tends to pull the tape tight and lose you an inch.
We ask for centimetres. If your tape is in inches, there is a conversion table at the bottom.
Shoes off, heels against a wall, standing straight, looking forward. Mark the wall at the top of your head with something flat and measure to the floor. Do not round up – if a production asks for 5′8″ to 5′10″ and you are 5′7″, being sent anyway wastes your day and theirs.
Roughly is fine. It is used for stunt doubling and harness work rather than costume.
Around the fullest part, under the arms and across the shoulder blades at the back. Check in a mirror that the tape has not slipped down behind you, which is easy to do and gives a reading several centimetres out. Keep your arms relaxed at your sides while someone measures.
Your natural waist, not your trouser waistband. It is the narrowest part of your torso, usually about an inch above your belly button. Bend sideways – the crease is your natural waist. Do not hold your stomach in.
Around the fullest part of your seat, feet together. Usually about 20cm below your natural waist. Keep the tape level and check it in a mirror at the back.
From the top of your inner thigh, right up in the crotch, down to the floor with shoes off. Measure your leg, not a pair of trousers you own: those have already been hemmed to a length someone chose.
UK sizing. If you are between sizes, give the larger – period shoes are unforgiving and you may be standing in them for twelve hours.
Around the base of the neck where a shirt collar sits, with one finger between the tape and your neck. Only needed if you might be put in a shirt and tie, but it takes ten seconds and saves a fitting.
Bodies change. If yours has, update your profile – it takes a minute, and costume would far rather have a number you changed last week than one you gave us two years ago.
Give your hair colour and length as they are today, even if your favourite photo shows something else. Continuity is the reason: if you are booked across several days you may be asked to leave your hair alone in between. If you have a change planned before a shoot, tell us.
Multiply inches by 2.54, or read it off here. Each table is two columns: the imperial figure on the left, centimetres on the right.
| Inches | Centimetres |
|---|---|
| 26″ | 66cm |
| 28″ | 71cm |
| 30″ | 76cm |
| 32″ | 81cm |
| 34″ | 86cm |
| 36″ | 91cm |
| 38″ | 97cm |
| 40″ | 102cm |
| 42″ | 107cm |
| 44″ | 112cm |
| 46″ | 117cm |
| 48″ | 122cm |
| 50″ | 127cm |
| 52″ | 132cm |
| Feet and inches | Centimetres |
|---|---|
| 4′10″ | 147cm |
| 5′0″ | 152cm |
| 5′2″ | 157cm |
| 5′4″ | 163cm |
| 5′6″ | 168cm |
| 5′8″ | 173cm |
| 5′10″ | 178cm |
| 6′0″ | 183cm |
| 6′2″ | 188cm |
| 6′4″ | 193cm |
| 6′6″ | 198cm |