‘She’s leaning into the idea that her image is a gilded fantasy’: how Taylor Swift embraced the showgirl

‘It’s not a surprise that we’re seeing a new side of her’ … Swift wearing an original Bob Mackie costume from the ‘Jewel Finale’ of the Las Vegas show Jubilee! Photograph: Mert Alas & Marcus Piggott

Taylor Swift has gone through many evolutions over her 20-year career: the guitar-strummer of her 2006 debut, the wide-eyed New Yorker on 1989, the introspective storyteller of Folklore and Midnights. Her two-year Eras tour established her as the defining entertainer of her generation, and after her recent engagement to American footballer Travis Kelce, one of its biggest celebrities. Now, after an unexpectedly brief hiatus, Swift returns with her 12th album in yet another guise: a showgirl.

Swift made The Life of a Showgirl with Swedish super-producers Max Martin and Shellback while touring Europe last year. She described the project as a tribute to her “joyful, wild, dramatic” life as an entertainer, and a look “behind the scenes” of the Eras spectacle. Album imagery by fashion photographers Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott shows Swift bejewelled with diamantes, fishnet tights, fur and feathered headdresses.