R.I.P. Bob Mackie, costume designer for Cher, Carol Burnett, and many more

Mackie, who dressed Hollywood for decades, was 87.

By Drew Gillis  |  September 14, 2026 | 1:14pm
Image: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images
Film News Bob Mackie
R.I.P. Bob Mackie, costume designer for Cher, Carol Burnett, and many more

Bob Mackie, a designer and costumer who clothed Hollywood for decades, has died. “He lived his 87 years to the fullest, fulfilling his dream of being a Fashion and Costume Designer, which is all he ever wanted to do,” reads a statement on his official Instagram. “His genius and extraordinary designs will live on forever, continuing to bring beauty into this world.” Mackie was 87 years old. 

Known as the “Sultan of Sequins,” Mackie’s fashion and costume designs include some of the most iconic showbusiness looks of the latter half of the 20th century. Mackie designed for the entire run of The Carol Burnett Show, creating the legendary “Went With The Wind!” curtain dress among hundreds of other costumes and evening gowns. Mackie also created several memorable looks for Cher, including at the Oscars and on her variety show. Other famous clients of Mackie’s include Tina Turner, Elton John, Diana Ross, and a Mattel line of Barbie dolls. Within just the past year, Sabrina Carpenter and Jean Smart’s character Deborah Vance have flaunted his archival looks. 

Born in Monterey Park, California in 1939, Mackie got his start sketching for costume designer Frank Thompson at Paramount. He also learned from Ray Aghayan—with whom Mackie had a romantic relationship from 1963 until Aghayan’s death in 2011—and from the legendary costume designer Edith Head. In the early 1960s, Mackie drew the original sketch for the dress that would become Marilyn Monroe’s iconic “Happy Birthday, Mr. President” outfit, and designed for Mitzi Gaynor and Diana Ross later that decade. Mackie’s work with Ross eventually earned him his first Academy Award nomination for Best Costume Design for Lady Sings the Blues. Nominations for the Funny Girl sequel Funny Lady and for Pennies From Heaven followed. 

It was in the 1970s that Mackie’s work became a regular fixture on the screens in homes across the United States as the costume designer for The Sonny And Cher Comedy Hour and The Carol Burnett Show. “Bob actually has a great comedic mind,” Burnett recalled in an interview with People in 2016, recalling how the costume for Mrs. Wiggins completely changed her characterization. “[W]hen I put the skirt on, it was tight in the knees and it dragged in the behind. And I said, ‘Bob, you’re going to have to take that in because I’m flat in my behind.’ But he said, ‘No, stick your behind into it.’ And that became her walk – that swaybacked walk with my butt sticking out, and that totally contributed to the character. He’d do that with so many of the sketches we were doing.” Over the course of his career, Mackie won nine Emmys (though none for The Carol Burnett Show) and was honored with an induction into the Television Hall Of Fame in 2002. 

 

Mackie’s career didn’t slow in the 1980s, designing for performers like Whitney Houston and Dolly Parton. His most famous sartorial moments from the decade, however, have to be his designs for Cher, whom he dressed at the Oscars twice, including when she won for her performance in Moonstruck. He also designed the infamous sheer costume Cher wears in the “If I Could Turn Back Time” in 1989. “I said, ‘Please don’t tell anyone that I designed this,'” he joked in a 2024 interview. “‘Don’t let anyone know this. I’m embarrassed,’ and she was fine about it. Now she admits that, no, it wasn’t so good.” Mackie’s relationship with Cher was depicted in the 2018 Broadway musical The Cher Show, for which the real Mackie won a Tony Award for Costume Design. 

Today, Mackie’s designs are generally associated with the glamour and excess of the 1970s and ’80s, but they have remained popular among a new generation of performers. Artists like Beyoncé and Pink have both worn his designs, and Miley Cyrus wore a Mackie original the night she won her first Grammy in 2024. He was described as modest about his own work; when asked if he had a favorite among his Carol Burnett Show designs, he simply said, “Anytime somebody walks out and the audience goes crazy and laughs and applauds, that is pretty good.”

 
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