Bob Mackie, the Emmy- and Tony-winning fashion and costume designer whose sequined, beaded and rhinestone-covered creations helped define the public images of some of the biggest stars in entertainment, has died at 87.
Mackie died on September 14, 2026, in Palm Springs, California, according to his publicist. His death was also announced through his official social media account. The cause of death was reported as pneumonia by CBS News and other outlets.
For more than five decades, Mackie understood something about celebrity clothing that few designers could match: a costume did not simply dress a performer. It could become part of the performance itself.
His designs were often impossible to ignore. Sequins, beads, feathers, rhinestones and elaborate embroidery became recurring elements of a visual language that was closely associated with stars including Cher, Carol Burnett, Diana Ross, Tina Turner, Elton John, Liza Minnelli and Madonna. His work could be glamorous, provocative, theatrical or deliberately funny, sometimes all within the same career.
Mackie’s relationship with Cher became one of the most recognisable designer-performer partnerships in modern entertainment. He created many of the revealing, heavily embellished costumes that became central to her stage and red-carpet image, including the sheer beaded gown she wore to the 1974 Met Gala. Cher later paid tribute to Mackie following his death, writing that he would be taking his sequins, beads and sketch pad with him.
But Cher was only one part of a career that stretched across television, film, Broadway and fashion.
Mackie became particularly well known through “The Carol Burnett Show,” where his costume designs helped turn comedy into visual spectacle. Among his most famous creations was the curtain costume worn by Burnett while parodying “Gone with the Wind.” The deliberately absurd outfit included the curtain rod and a piece of valance, transforming a familiar Hollywood image into one of television’s most remembered comedy costumes. The costume is now held by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.
His career also intersected with some of Hollywood’s most enduring images. Early in his career, Mackie worked as a sketch artist under designer Jean Louis, and he sketched the design for the sheer, beaded gown Marilyn Monroe wore while singing “Happy Birthday” to President John F. Kennedy in 1962.
The range of his work was reflected in the awards that followed. Mackie received more than 30 Emmy nominations and won nine. He won a Tony Award for his costume work on the Broadway musical “The Cher Show” and received three Academy Award nominations for costume design, including for “Lady Sings the Blues,” “Funny Lady” and “Pennies From Heaven.” He was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 2002.
Mackie also worked beyond celebrity costumes. He designed clothing for Barbie, developed a ready-to-wear fashion line and became an early partner of QVC. His influence continued to surface decades after some of his most famous designs first appeared, with archival Mackie pieces worn by contemporary performers including Zendaya and Miley Cyrus.
What separated Mackie’s work from ordinary red-carpet dressing was its sense of theatre. He designed for performers who were already larger than life and understood that clothing could amplify that presence rather than compete with it. In a 2025 interview with CBS, Mackie explained that he watched how performers moved, walked and worked on stage before deciding what to put them in. “You can’t just put a dress on anybody,” he said.
That approach helped make his work instantly recognisable. Mackie did not appear interested in making every star conform to the same idea of elegance. His clothes were built around personality, movement and spectacle, and his most memorable designs often looked as though they belonged to the performer who wore them and nobody else.
His influence also outlived the era in which many of his most famous costumes were created. Contemporary fashion has repeatedly returned to the visual vocabulary he helped establish, while younger performers have drawn from his archives and designers have continued to reference the theatrical glamour associated with his work.
Mackie was born Robert Gordon Mackie in Monterey Park, California, in 1939. As a child, he was fascinated by Hollywood musicals and began drawing elaborate costumes. He later studied art and costume design before entering Hollywood’s costume industry.
His career eventually made him one of the most recognisable costume designers in American popular culture, but the legacy was never simply about glitter. Mackie understood the relationship between clothing and identity at a time when television, music and celebrity culture were becoming increasingly intertwined. His designs gave performers another way to communicate who they were, or who they wanted to become, before they even stepped onto a stage.
That is why so many of his costumes became more than garments. They became images that audiences remembered long after the performances ended.
Bob Mackie spent his career making clothes that demanded to be seen. His death marks the end of an era for one of the designers who helped make celebrity fashion a form of entertainment in its own right.
