Visiting the set of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season three was exactly like crossing into another realm. Middle-earth felt just as rich and alive in person as it does on TV. The scope and scale of the world, from the largest prop to the smallest inscription on a dagger, are beyond the ability of words to fully convey. And though no amount of writing can capture it all, in this piece I’ve attempted to distill out some of my very favorite specifics from the many conversations I had with The Rings of Power‘s creators and department heads. Here are 13 details we learned while visiting the awe-inspiring world of The Rings of Power Season 3 set, featuring insights from the people behind the costumes, props, hair and makeup, production design, and more.
Table of contents
- The Rings of Power Season 3’s Theme Is “What Matters Most to You When Everything Is Falling Apart?”
- Celeborn’s Hair and Makeup Truly Tell a Story
- Tolkien’s Lore Rules Are King on The Rings of Power Season 3 Set
- The Rings of Power Has an Expert Prop Maker Just for the Dwarves’ Ale
- The Rings of Power Season 3 Created a Dwarven Game You Can Actually Play
- Trystan Gravelle Wanted Pharazôn to have a Top Knot (And a Little Bit on Kemen)
- Míriel Shows Her True Self This Season, Beyond the Trappings of Her Role
- Númenór Is One Incredible Set
- Galadriel’s Blade Is the Most Complicated Sword Made for This Season
- The Rings of Power Season 3 Tried a Skirt on Galadriel, But It Wasn’t Right Yet
- How to Walk Like an Elf
- Disa Is Repping Her Man Durin
- The Rings of Power Season 3 IS Dark, But Has the Same Warmth, Beauty, and Light As Always
The Rings of Power Season 3’s Theme Is “What Matters Most to You When Everything Is Falling Apart?”
When we spoke to showrunners J. D. Payne and Patrick McKay during our visit to Middle-earth, we asked them to set the scene for The Rings of Power season three. Here’s what they shared with us.
In season three, the theme that emerged seemed to be, ‘When the world seems to be falling into darkness and everything everywhere, it looks like it’s going sideways. Where do you put your chips? Who are you? What matters most to you when it looks like everything’s falling apart?’ And that’s something that felt like it was cropping up in a certain way in every story. And it felt very universal and timeless in that wonderful Tolkienian way. And I dare say it even felt applicable to things we were feeling in the world. And when you hit upon something like that, you just tease it out a little bit, and hopefully you feel that when you watch them, the episodes.
Celeborn’s Hair and Makeup Truly Tell a Story
We stopped by to say hello to Makeup and Hair Designer Flora Moody on The Rings of Power season three set and asked her which hair and makeup told the biggest story this season. And she let us know that it was Celeborn for her. She revealed, “It’s lovely to be able to have someone who’s beautiful, elven, everything perfect that we’ve done on all the elves, but then to mess it up majorly as well. So, he goes through a lot in terms of blood, bruising, and then into beauty.”
Tolkien’s Lore Rules Are King on The Rings of Power Season 3 Set
Before doing anything else, The Rings of Power Season 3 Set Decorator Tina Jones and Prop Master John Hajdukiewicz refreshed themselves on the rules of Tolkien’s lore. For example, they noted, The dwarves use a lot of straight lines, and they don’t have wood things in their spaces.” So inside a Dwarven tavern in Khazad-dûm, a place where ordinarily there would be lots of wood, the team considered “the idea of the wood of the bar being fossilized, and the tables and chairs being made to look like heavy stone.” Instead of typical glasses, the dwarves received square tankards. And the normally round kegs of a drinking hall were made angular, except the ones that were received through trade with the elves.
We sat in the incredible dwarven tavern ourselves and were very impressed by the squareness of it all, as well as how everything in it was built on a huge scale to make The Rings of Power‘s dwarves (and us) look extra short. We also especially loved how the tables and chairs were carved with words in the dwarven alphabet, giving the tavern a lived-in feel, as though generations of dwarves had impatiently scratched their names into the stone.
Jones and Hajdukiewicz estimate that approximately 140,000 props were used in The Rings of Power season three.
The Rings of Power Has an Expert Prop Maker Just for the Dwarves’ Ale
The dwarves certainly love their ale. To make sure it always looks just right, The Rings of Power hired an expert prop maker who works on Guinness commercials and other well-known beer ads, just to look after the dwarven ale and its foam. The ale has to survive take after take, after all. And it wouldn’t do for Durin’s beer to fall flat.
The Rings of Power Season 3 Created a Dwarven Game You Can Actually Play
During our set visit, Prop Master John Hajdukiewicz introduced us to the Dwarven game Ukthag, which means “warrior.” This game was designed for Durin’s children to play… And for the drunken dwarves visiting the tavern to enjoy. And that meant it needed to be pretty simple.
In the end, The Rings of Power‘s crew landed on a mash-up of Snakes and Ladders and Loophole. Hajdukiewicz tells us this dwarven game is fully playable and has, in fact, been played many times by the cast and crew. The goal of Ukthag is to be the first player to reach the top of the mountain… and whoever does that becomes King of the Mountain. A title many surely wish to claim… Ultimately, this dwarven game is a numbers game: players start at the base of the mountain, roll a 12-sided die, and move their piece accordingly. But beware: if you land on the wrong tile, you’re sent packing all the way back down the mountain.
To play, players move their carved stone movers. There are seven movers in total, who represent the seven Dwarf-Lords of Middle-earth. These pieces reflect John Howe’s design of the dwarven rulers.
Of course, this is no ordinary board game. It comes from Middle-earth. The whole game is made of heavy stone and has true dimension. The gameboard isn’t flat; Ukthag is literally shaped like a mini mountain, with the game paths carved into it. Hajdukiewicz notes he wanted the game to give him the same feeling he got when he first saw Star Wars‘ 3D Chess. He wanted to be seen from across the room.
Trystan Gravelle Wanted Pharazôn to have a Top Knot (And a Little Bit on Kemen)
Makeup and Hair Designer Flora Moody tells us that Trystan Gravelle wanted Pharazôn to have a warrior’s look, a top-knot and shaved sides. But Moody reveals it wasn’t quite the time for that yet. Pharazôn and his faction do get to be very royal, very gold, and very in power, though. And he does get to have a crossbow in The Rings of Power season three, which Master Armorer Alex Francis reveals is fully practical, even as it drips with royal elegance. The sun and the eagle, Pharazôn’s symbols, influence its design.
Meanwhile, Kemen has littered himself with many awards, shares Costume Designer Libby Dempster. His ego is truly inflated, and to reflect that, his outfit contains many ceremonial brooches… But he’s self-decorated. These are awards he’s giving to himself.
Míriel Shows Her True Self This Season, Beyond the Trappings of Her Role
Costume Designer Libby Dempster notes that while Pharazôn has gone full Númenórean King mode, Míriel has embraced her true heart. She’ll be in lovely blues, paler tones, and softer looks throughout this season. One Míriel dress we see looks like the ocean, gorgeously floaty and full of life. Dempster notes the fabric was pour-dyed on set and hand-embroidered. And while this version of Míriel in The Rings of Power season three is no less intricate, it’s simplified and less restrictive. Míriel has lost some royalty but gained the feeling of who she truly is. Dempster shares that, through this gown, we get the sense that Míriel would love to be dressed this way all the time; that this dress reveals her inner reality. But so often, Míriel must instead be wearing the trappings of her role.
Númenór Is One Incredible Set
Production Designer Kristian Milsted says Númenór is a fantasy Frankenstein. The buildings of Númenór need to rival any buildings in history, but they can’t look like anything else. They need to look otherworldly and fantastical. And so The Rings of Power has cherry-picked ideas from Venice, the Middle East, and many other places to create their fantasy civilization. In The Rings of Power season three, we see new corners and different parts of Númenór, everything from the most sumptuous of Pharazôn’s rooms and new palace designs to the most delicately beautiful sacred places in the city. (We might even see a statue of Númenór’s founder, Elros, also played this season by Elrond actor Robert Aramayo.)
Númenór, Milsted shares, took 18 weeks to build. And it truly, TRULY shows. I was lucky enough to step into the courtyards and streets of the Númenór set, and I truly felt transported to a distant, magical city. There were nooks, crannies, and archways. Secret, winding stone paths led me into hidden corners. I was able to climb three levels up to a rooftop and look upon the whole city beneath me as banners and cloths fluttered from window sills and hanging ropes. Tucked into the design of a wall, I swear I spotted a pattern of Aragorn’s crown. Aragorn, of course, will be one of Númenór’s most famous descendants. Númenór was big enough that I could disappear inside it. It stretched endless before my eyes.
Most beautiful of all was a hidden altar, tucked away, a facsimile of Númenór’s white tree offering it shade from the afternoon sun. Elros’ kind face peering down from above.
Galadriel’s Blade Is the Most Complicated Sword Made for This Season
This season, Galadriel’s blade is a truly iconic piece. While most swords share a universal language—blade, crossguard, handle, pommel, etc.—Galadriel’s sword in The Rings of Power season three required much more precision and custom work. It’s such a specific piece that conventional sword-making techniques wouldn’t cut it for this blade. Master Armorer Alex Francis shares that to him it feels like veins that all connect, have to build together, and then be cast.
This time around, Galadriel’s blade represents not one, but two races. It’s actually a dwarven weapon made for elves, so each species had to be equally present in its forging. Francis notes that it’s very Art Nouveau, a typical elven choice, but the material choices are more dwarven. The creators wanted to ensure the blade “met in the middle” between dwarven and elven signatures.
On Galadriel’s sword, there is an inscription that reads, “As the sun rises, darkness shall fall.” A beautiful message for the future Lady of Light to carry.
The Rings of Power Season 3 Tried a Skirt on Galadriel, But It Wasn’t Right Yet
At the end of The Rings of Power season two, we see Galadriel in a simple white dress, looking more than ever like her future incarnation as the wise lady of Lothlórien. But in The Rings of Power season three, Galadriel largely trades back her gowns for armor and leggings. Costume Designer Libby Dempster reveals they tried a layered, softer skirt on her that was “still armored,” but it just “wasn’t yet time” for that look; it had too much sway and drape and didn’t make sense for Galadriel’s season three adventures. In a way, Dempster felt the look became “too pedestrian,” so “back in chainmail” it was.
Ultimately, we love the look Galadriel has ended up in, especially the shirt she wears under her main armor. This piece has over 3,000 tiny studs embedded into it, and it is GORGEOUS. Look out for it in later episodes.
Also, if you’re interested in learning more about chainmail so thin it looks almost like fabric, Dempster shares that The Rings of Power‘s costume department buys butcher chainmail in fine sheets to make its elven costumes. Yes, the elves are done up in the chainmail that butchers wear so they don’t cut their hands on the meat machines—and we’re obsessed.
How to Walk Like an Elf
Movement Director Tallulah Holly-Massey gave us an in-depth lesson on how to walk like an Uruk orc. But we also wanted to know how to walk like an elf. For the curious, here are the rules for walking like a member of the elvenkind in The Rings of Power.
First, as an elf, move from the ear before the eyes. And never create a spiral or embellish anything. Be quite direct and take the shortest pathway for any motion. If you pick something up off the ground, go straight down, no hesitation. Whatever the shortest pathway is an elf will always choose that route. When an elf walks, they step with their whole foot at once; they don’t go heel then toe or toe then heel. Elves don’t have levels, nor are they ever loosey-goosey. Everything is very straight and stays in one level unit. Elves are statuesque but simple, straightforward in a sense. If they walk into a conversation, they stop with their whole body at once.
If they were to die though, they would die sequentially and still look beautiful… Whereas an orc would just collapse in a heap.
Disa Is Repping Her Man Durin
You think you’re a big fan of your significant other? Costume Designer Libby Dempster shares that Disa is actually wearing Durin’s image on her golden breastplate. Yep, that’s hubby, and that’s true love.
The Rings of Power Season 3 IS Dark, But Has the Same Warmth, Beauty, and Light As Always
Showrunners J. D. Payne and Patrick McKay sum up The Rings of Power season three by sharing, “Certainly season three is darker, and I think more psychological and dramatic in some ways, but it’s the same show. There’s warmth and beauty and humor and lightness. I think that if people like the first two seasons, I think season three is just going to be better and more of the same. But hopefully also there’s some new inroads for new audiences as well.”
If you loved The Rings of Power seasons one and two or are just tuning in, we’re excited to have you. Make sure to tune in when The Rings of Power season three releases on November 11.
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Source: Kiat Media
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