Mak Sherrid ’24 starting to make his mark in the costume industry

For Mak Sherrid, work isn’t just work. 

It’s a sense of childlike wonder, and a chance to use his creative skills in costuming to bring that wonder to a wide audience. Whether it’s his day job as Assistant Director of Costume at the award-winning Dutch Wonderland theme park, or his passion projects in cosplay, costume design, and creation give this member of the Class of 2024 “the ability to question things and always be asking, Why?

“I’ve learned how to be a kid again. It caused me to think differently about what I do.  My art is something that I’m giving back and creating for others … Art should feel like you’re giving back to a community. If it was only for you, you wouldn’t be putting it out there.”

Lessons learned 

Sherrid – a BFA graduate in Illustration with minors in Live Entertainment & Experience Design and Business in Creative Industry – was an active member of the PCA&D community while still on campus. A vice president and president of Student Council, he also was founding president of the Cosplay Club.

To be now sitting in budget meetings at work, he said, takes him back to his Student Council days. Building a new department at Dutch Wonderland (those duties previously had been outsourced) brings him back to both helping to found the Cosplay Club and rebuilding Student Council after the pandemic was over. 

Mak Sherrid’s sketch for “Princess Brook”‘s Halloween gown at Dutch Wonderland. Courtesy of the artist.

But it’s the joy he gets from making new costumes, repairing costumes, inventorying them, and keeping the cast of up to 20 actors in operation and safe – with nearly 300 costumes of all kinds, not counting duplicates – that keeps Sherrid busy when the park season heats up. 

“Cosplay work and this job inform each other very, very well,” Sherrid added. “In both, you have to keep in mind the structural experience, the elements that can be stepped on or walked over, and the actor has to feel comfortable and safe in moving in it.”

That leads to a lesson from art school that he said has been instrumental in the success he’s had so far: When something isn’t working, you fix it, and you go again. You try a new iteration, sometimes more than once a day. “It’s the flow of creativity and the improv of it. Part of building a costume needs to make room for improv. Making sure your performers are comfortable and safe, and there are no things that will distract them from their performance: It’s a really important part of costume engineering, and something you might not think of at first.”

Another lesson from PCA&D: Sherrid’s ability to multitask. For example, the Halloween costume worn by the character Princess Brooke had to be worked on while Sherrid also was tasked with starting Winter Wonderland costumes for the park’s next big season, along with costumes for other characters. “We knew we needed to change it up. It needed some TLC for its integrity and to be more princess-like.” As a new, small department, the budget also was “pretty small,” Sherrid recalled. “My supervisor came in with a box (and said) ‘Here you go; it’s what we have to work with.’” 

“It is,” Sherrid said, “a situation where I’m better for it. It goes back to PCA&D where I’d have one prompt, or be assigned to work with a single color – I learned a lot about working within boundaries.” And as a result, he was able to finish updates to the dress within just a couple weeks and within deadline. 

Another lesson: the ability to make quick decisions that he worked on at PCA&D, is a lesson “that carries through until now. It allows me to understand and sympathize with the cast. Learning how to prioritize. Working on thinking on my feet: I had the opportunity to tackle that (skill) at PCA&D.”

This year – Sherrid started the job just a few weeks after his May graduation – “just scratched the surface,” he said. And his advice for other creatives? “Push through what you think you can handle. Learn to deal with those tight deadlines and your time awareness. Embrace the chaos. PCA&D taught me how to work with that. It keeps things creative.”

Mak Sherrid’s finished costume for the “Princess Brooke” character at Dutch Wonderland’s Halloween celebration. Photo courtesy Mak Sherrid.