Designer Carmela Lane Creates Halloween's Sexiest Club Costumes

Have you ever gone to a VIP club in New York City with professional dancers, employed by the clubs themselves? These dancers are the ones who shimmy around on table tops or cages, in costumes of sequins and feathers. Well, chances are, those extravagant costumes are all made by Carmela Lane. According to THUMP, Carmela is a 36-year-old Brazilian native who designs all the outrageously sexy costumes for most of New York's high-end clubs: Marquee, PH-D at Dream Downtown, TAO, Lavo and Avenue. She has dressed dancers for club nights headlined by Avicii, Afrojack and Tiesto, a private auction on Leonardo DiCaprio's birthday and even the stages at Ultra Music Festival.

For a $325 consultation fee, Carmela also makes custom costumes for private clients.

With Halloween quickly approaching, Carmela has not been able to sleep much at all. For the last three weeks, she has risen while it's still dark out, at 4:30 a.m., and doesn't stop working for another 16 hours. Aside from a couple assistants who help with schedulings and fittings, Carmela's a one-woman production team, doing everything from coming up with costume themes to sewing each piece by hand. Impressive!

"Halloween is big for children, but I feel adults are enjoying it more every year," Lane told PIX11 News. "I have people who start planning three to four months before Halloween and they just start calling me, ready to tell me what they want to be for Halloween."

Carmela says the key to a truly spectacular costume is creativity and originality.

"I hate when people copy me, and it happens a lot," she said.

She cites an example: A while ago, she came up with lit-up umbrellas for dancers to twirl at Avicii's birthday party at Marquee. A few months later, she saw the same umbrellas posted on social media, used at a rival club.

But in the end, she shakes it off:

"Of course, everything has been done and nothing is 100 percent original, but you can always make your own version. Turn it into something that's yours."

As for DIY designers looking to make their own Halloween costumes at home, Carmela offers one piece of advice: Trimmings make everything better.

"Sequins are your secret weapon," she says.