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After a 31-year tenure on the Las Vegas Boulevard, the dancers from the revue Jubilee! took a final synchronised kick in 2016. The production, renowned for its ornate costumes crafted by style icon Bob Mackie, ended its run due to declining audience numbers and unimpressed critics who labeled it a spectacle “a relic of another era”.

Currently, almost a decade later, showgirls, or at least the glamorous showgirl look, is experiencing a revival.

The Sultan of Glitz

Dubbed the “master of glitz”, Mackie has made dramatic showgirl glamour his defining aesthetic, dressing everyone from screen legends to Madonna. Earlier this month, a “barely-there” bodysuit he created for Cher in 1978 sold for $57,600, seven times its initial estimate, while a silver and gold tasseled bodysuit with shiny wings that Mackie designed for Tina Turner for a 1977 concert sold for $19,200.

“I believe it looks more appealing for the new generation of stars who is seeking something other than what they grew up with”, he told a media outlet. “New stars are striving for a theatrical, more spectacular, breathtaking, memorable statement.”

A Mainstream Resurgence

It’s a look that made its way all the way to the heart of the cultural zeitgeist in 2025 thanks to a chart-topping superstar. Earlier this year, the entertainment titan wore one of Mackie’s vintage Jubilee! costumes on the cover of her new musical project. The bedazzled bra and thong, plumed armbands and shimmering headpiece were tailor-made for a record named The Life of a Showgirl.

She has company. This year, showgirl references have been incorporated by music artists including Dua Lipa as they zoomed across arena stages in sequins, strategic openings and plumes, highlighted against camp sets. Her fashion curator Lorenzo Posocco told Vogue he wanted to bring “a showgirl spirit” to her Radical Optimism tour – drawing from pictures from the mid-century, the backup dancers waved giant plumed accessories.

Pulling from Tradition

These artists and other hitmakers also reference classic entertainment forms, including classic theater and chorus line references. The outcome are vastly different from the 1990s era pop style of revealing tops and cargo pants, and urban dance moves that were popular earlier.

But not everyone are convinced with this showgirl renaissance. A former performer, a one-time Jubilee! showgirl who danced in the early 2000s says the trend is “bemusing”. She thinks the word showgirl title is being “employed as an catch-all phrase covering everything from The Radio City Rockettes to Broadway performers and now even today's icons.”

The Coveted Vintage Style

For gen Z and millennial stars, Mackie’s classic designs have become highly covetable. In 2024, a style icon honored to one of Mackie’s earliest clients, Cher, when the star wore a semi-sheer embellished dress designed by the designer in 2001, which was similar to one he created for Cher to wear in 1967. Months after, another pop star paid an private amount to buy the Mackie fringed mini dress she had worn previously to perform at the Grammys. In September, the singer wore a series of vintage Mackie designs at the MTV Video Music Awards. They are also a hit among collectors.

“Showgirls inspire fond memories for a past glamour,” says a historian, head of special collections at the an academic institution, who documents the history of showgirls. “Today it is considered a sort of ‘acceptable’ appeal because it has been adapted. It has got all the elegance, the sparkles and the sparkle but without the nudity.”

A Than Just Fashion: An Icon of Vegas

The expert says showgirls are integral to the iconography of Vegas. She points to former mayor Oscar Goodman who, during official events, was surrounded by two showgirls. Although Las Vegas does not host any showgirl-centric productions, Jung says they are still used as an symbol of the city, being present at conventions and in marketing. “The showgirl is still a enduring symbol of Las Vegas glitz and glamour,” she says.

An Appeal of Illusion

The former showgirl says the complete change of a showgirl is part of the appeal. It’s something Taylor Swift alludes to in a recent behind-the-scenes film that documents the off-camera action from her year-long 2023 Eras tour, which included intense practice sessions, workouts and countless shows across 21 countries, each running for 3.5 hours.

Hardy recalls her own nights in the spotlight as “similar to running a marathon in high heels every night”. Her headpiece weighed 34lbs. “I had to wear it all the way up the steps to the stage from the backstage area three floors below in the underground. I had to head up ahead of time for my moment so I could rest before I made my entrance. You are sweating the whole time but maintaining this image that it’s effortless and stunning and dreamlike.”

Maybe this is where the appeal of the showgirl fantasy really lies. In the complexity of 2025 there is a longing for escapism. Who better to look to than showgirls, who have always represented fantasy, flawlessness and a universe where no one misses a mark.