The opera cloak gets a stylish update

When creative director Barbara Ayozie Fu Safira picks a coat to wear for a special occasion, there’s only one contender: an opera cloak. “It’s glamorous, babe,” she tells me, by way of explanation, from her London home.

For Ayozie Fu Safira, an opera cloak — often defined by its long length, diamond or ribbon ties at the neck and tent-like shape that swings — is a source of strength and confidence. She has several to choose from, including an enveloping beige alpaca cloak with hoodie by Gianni Versace, a slim-fit navy cashmere style by Yohji Yamamoto and a 19th-century officer’s blue cape with silk magenta lining that she has repurposed as an opera coat. On wearing one, she says, “I could face anything, you know, as it is [like] armour.” 

Ayozie Fu Safira may find that she’s not the only one to embrace opera cloaks this season. The actor Angelina Jolie has already been seen wearing more operatic styles on the red carpet as she promotes her tour de force as Maria Callas in the ultimate opera film: Maria, a biopic of the impeccably tailored 20th-century soprano, in which she wears a black cape dress. Off camera, Jolie wore a charcoal grey opera cape coat with tie-front detail to a screening at Ham Yard Hotel in London, and donned a black opera shawl with an fur wrap as she attended the Metropolitan Opera’s Tosca Gala in New York.

Also worth noting is the return next year of HBO Original’s 19th-century period drama The Gilded Age, which ended last season with the new-moneyed Russell family donning lavish opera cloaks to show off their social supremacy.

Beatrice Behlen, senior fashion curator at the Museum of London, traces the opera cloak’s origins back to the early 19th century, when specific opera venues, such as La Scala in Milan, emerged and offered a place “where women could go” that was not seedy. And as crinolines appeared during that period, opera capes became more voluminous, covering the wearer from neck to toe, in order to “protect the dress in the melee of the opera house”, explains Behlen.

When dresses became shorter in the 1920s, so did the opera cloak, which became knee-length. Sleeves were added (thus the opera coat was introduced). They were also increasingly adorned with fur and made of brocade and metallic threads, as people developed an interest in wearing “shiny things”, says Behlen. By the 1950s, swinging opera cloaks in silk or satin made their debut.

Today, the appeal of opera cloaks endures, with designers continuing to experiment with the style by implementing new colours and finishes. Laura Kim and Fernando Garcia’s midi tulle opera coat for Oscar de la Renta graduates from black to blue, and comes with a detachable belt for versatility (£2,650 on sale, farfetch.com). Miu Miu’s gold lamé piece (£6,900, miumiu.com) and Los Angeles-based Libertine’s opera coat in metallic floral brocade ($6,250, bergdorfgoodman.com) lend extra glamour. Rick Owens’ oversized black velvet opera cape has a gothic feel (£1,228 on sale, mytheresa.com); Stella McCartney has added a more tailored touch to hers, with silky satin lapels; and Dolce & Gabbana adds a feather hood to give its wool and cashmere opera cloak a sexier vibe (£4,700, dolceandgabbana.com). And they’re not only for winter: sheer chiffon capes trailed down the runway at Chanel’s spring/summer 2025 show.

The bigger silhouette of a cloak offers “lots of space to play with”, says fashion designer Erdem Moralıoğlu. His autumn/winter 2024 show featured opera cloaks, including a white textured style with 10,000 hand-embroidered rose petals that took days to make as “every silk flower had to be re-appliqued over every seam”, he says. Inspiration for these capes came from the clothes that Maria Callas wore offstage. The release of Jolie’s movie is purely coincidental, though — Moralıoğlu says his collection was “done and dusted before I knew about the film”.

Walid al Damirji, founder of couture and homeware brand By Walid, creates opera cloaks by hand-stitching them from antique textiles, such as 19th-century Chinese embroidery. The upcycled approach means that sometimes there isn’t enough fabric to go around, requiring Damirji to strengthen the design with additional materials, such as superfine cotton. Case in point: a new Leila coat made from a 19th-century Venetian lace tablecloth is backed with organic superfine cotton (£1,725, bywalid.uk).

But how to style an opera cloak? Ayozie Fu Safira believes that the key to wearing one stylishly is balancing it with what is worn underneath. She wears her navy Yohji Yamamoto opera coat with a black high-neck sweater, wool trousers and black stiletto boots because “the pleat of the coat is the same pleat as the trousers”. And “don’t add too much” — like a scarf or jewellery — she adds, “because [the cloaks] are complete in themselves so they don’t need anything else.”

Azzi Glasser, founder of the London-based fragrance brand The Perfumer’s Story, is another opera-cloak fan. Her green silk embroidered Simone Rocha opera coat, nabbed a couple of years ago at Dover Street Market, is “the best coat I’ve ever invested in”, she says, for its ability to make her “stand out in a crowd”.

“You just throw that on and suddenly it becomes the centre piece,” she says. Next, Glasser is considering having an opera cloak made for her by couturier Giles Deacon that would include “an element of who I am”, she says, so it’s “telling my story — like they do at an opera”.

The glamour of an opera cloak is appreciated by men, too. Party planner Henry Conway often wears a navy or black wool opera cloak to bars and dinner engagements, as well as to the opera, because of “the swish of it”, he says. “You kind of feel like you are in a film [or] in another age.” To avoid looking costume-y, Conway styles his opera cape over a white polo neck, Gieves & Hawkes blazer and matching trousers, or dresses in all black.

Online, a new generation is discovering the joy of opera cloaks. On TikTok, Carla Rockmore has garnered more than 37,000 likes to date for showing how she dresses down her vintage sky-blue rhinestone-button opera coat “with a graphic vintage [Pepsi-Cola] tee and a great pair of jeans”. Then there’s the 443,500 people who have viewed Nyja Rich getting ready for the Met Opera: she wore a balloon-sleeved pink satin cape (her mother wore a blue version to the same event).

With opera cloaks, it doesn’t take much to draw attention. And perhaps that’s their appeal. That seems to be the case for Rich’s fans. “We love the drama,” enthused one follower in the comments.

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