Designer Lisa McKinnon is creating the costumes for all three U.S. women's figure skaters at the 2026 Olympics, including a Madonna-inspired dress for Amber Glenn's routine to 'Like a Prayer'. McKinnon's design process is driven by the music, aiming to capture its essence in the costumes, while Glenn advocates for visibility and mental health awareness.
The Olympics will be something of a Lisa McKinnon fashion show, with the Los Angeles based designer dressing all three of the individual U.S. women figure skaters.U.S. figure skating star Amber Glenn is wearing a dress inspired by Madonna while skating to her hit “Like a Prayer” at the 2026 Milan-Cortina- Olympics .
“I start sketching,” she said, “and it comes out.”, McKinnon’s stylus glides around her screen like a skater on ice. With each stroke, she pieces together the costumes her clients will wear when they compete on the grandest stage in sports.. “I come up with the designs based on what I feel when I listen to the music. That’s how I come up with the color and the style and the lines and the silhouette. Should it be flowy? Is it modern? What is it?”Amber Glenn wearing a Madonna-inspired dress during the 2026 U.S. Figure Skating Championships. Figure skater Amber Glenn once hid parts of herself to fit into a sport that prized perfection. Now, as an openly bisexual and pansexual athlete, she’s using her platform to push for visibility, inclusion, and mental health awareness on and off the ice. So, McKinnon put “Like a Prayer” on repeat at her Los Angeles studio. The hit 1989 song was added to her Olympic playlist after it was selected by U.S. figure skating star Glenn and her choreographer Kaitlyn Weaver had collaborated on the routine’s choreography with one of Madonna’s backup dancers, who also offered input on the costume design. “They just wanted it to be sexy, mature, pushing it a little bit but not too much, and just really give the vibe of ‘Like a Prayer,'” McKinnon said.Lisa McKinnon sketching a dress at her studio in Los Angeles. McKinnon began sketching a burgundy off-the-shoulder dress with a lace corset, replicating elements of Madonna’s look in the music video. She added frill around the wrists that Glenn had requested, giving the costume movement in that area when she did the prayer hand gesture.But she wanted it to be less figure skater and more “Material Girl.” Luckily, McKinnon was living in a material world — with plenty of fabrics, dyes and chains at her disposal. “It needed to feel raw and simple, in a way,” she said, “but just like a big old statement necklace at the same time.”Instead of the traditional crystal embellishments typically seen on ice, McKinnon layered necklaces, chains and pendants of varying shades, accessorizing like Madonna in the 1980s. Glenn added to the metallic collection when she wore the dress at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in January and won the gold medal with a record-breaking performance. She’ll soon strike a pose in her Madonna-inspired dress at the Olympics, while “Like a Prayer” plays in Milan, just as it once did on repeat in McKinnon’s headphones. And the"Queen of Pop" herself said she'll be watching.'You just don't say no' From left to right, silver medalist Alysa Liu, gold medalist Amber Glenn, and bronze medalist Isabeau Levito pose with their medals at the 2026 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in St. Louis. When the top three finishers at Nationals took their places, each was wearing a dress made by the designer. Glenn was at the top step, having just claiming her third consecutive U.S. figure skating title. Taking silver was Alysa Liu. Bronze went to Isabeau Levito. Days later, they claimed the three spots for women’s singles on the U.S. figure skating Olympic team, meaning McKinnon would be dressing each for the Games being held in the fashion capital of the world. "The fact that Amber, Isabeau and Alysa all made the Olympic team was, I mean, we were hoping obviously, but it's kind of crazy that it actually happened," said McKinnon, whose 2026 Olympian clients also included U.S. ice dancers Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko. “We've had, you know, one or so, but not the sweep, And they're so cute together. They're adorable the three of them. So, it just makes it extra special because everyone loves them.’"Entering the season as the designer for multiple Olympic-caliber athletes on the same team creates a need for variation that, McKinnon says, enhances their individuality and compliments their personalities. “I need to try to make sure that they keep their unique styles,” she said. “And those three women are so different from one another that they all have their own styles. So, it's important that I don't create costumes for them that look alike. That's not good. So, it's a lot of pressure to not only do the best costumefor each of them, but to make sure that they are all individually representing themselves and what they do and that it doesn't necessarily immediately scream that they are all from the same designer."Glenn, a 26-year-old Texas native who in 2019 publicly came out as bisexual and pansexual, is comfortable deviating from traditional attire, saying she will wear whatever the story calls for without hesitation. “For Amber, this year was totally about embracing her maturity,” McKinnon said. “She's come so far when it comes to finding herself and how she wants to live her life and who she wants to be when she goes out on the ice.” Levito, an 18-year-old who was born in Philadelphia and raised in New Jersey, enjoys portraying characters on the ice and has been described as a figure skating showgirl. Her short program this year, for which she wears an elegant red dress while skating to a Sophia Loren medley, followed a “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” design that replicated Audrey Heburn’s iconic black dress with white pearls. “Her style is very balletic,” McKinnon said. “We can't drown her in a costume that's full of detailing … All that has to be minimalistic, in a way, but just enough to enhance her beautiful posture and her body and the way that she skates.” Liu, a 20-year-old from California who won her first U.S. title at the age of 13, helped the U.S. capture a bronze medal in the team event at the 2022 Beijing Games. Shortly after, she announced her retirement at just 16 years old. She returned in 2024 under her own terms, taking a more hands-on philosophy for her style and costumes. “She had a more modern approach, in a way where she was like, ‘I don't give a damn about what people think or this and that. I want!’” McKinnon said. “So, then it would be all, like, how can we make’ I want this’ into something that actually works also on the ice in front of people?”. The dress had a mix of crystals, pearls, spikes, payettes and other embellishments that created a unique texture for the ice. But when she takes the ice in Milan, she’ll be debuting two new dresses – changing her short program music and costume after the artist of the song she planned to use wasWith only a few weeks before the Olympics, it was time to design a new dress, which McKinnon said from initial sketches to finished product for elite skaters can take anywhere from a combined 60 to 100 hours and cost up to $8,000.Lisa McKinnon began ice skating when she was four-years-old. Born and raised in Mariestad, Sweden, she began skating when she was just four-years-old. “I grew up in a small town in Sweden,” she said. “And so, you put your kids in skates and say, ‘Go!’” She hasn’t stopped since. After seeing a “Holiday on Ice” show in Stockholm, she began dreaming of one day getting hired by a touring ice show. Around the age of 11, she also began to make her own practice outfits, and five years later was making costumes for other skaters. Her two passions weaved together, showing her that figure skating and fashion are cut from the same cloth. She went on the road with different touring companies for 16 years, advancing from skater to performance director. During her time off, she'd make costumes. McKinnon later worked in the costume department with two different Cirque du Soleil shows in Las Vegas and served as assistant costume designer for “Barbie LIVE” the musical. She became costume supervisor for the Wallis Annenberg Center of the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills. “Some friends of mine that were now coaching called me and said, ‘Hey, could you just make one costume for my student?’ And then it just snowballed from there. Then finally I was like, ‘You know what? I really enjoy it. I know I'm good at it. It seems like there's enough demand to actually have a business here.'” She launched Lisa McKinnon Designs. McKinnon quickly attracted elite skaters, including Karen Chen and Ashley Wagner when they placed first and second respectively at the 2017 U.S. Figure Skating Championships.Lisa McKinnon at her studio in Los Angeles. She dressed Olympic gold-medalists at the 2018 Pyeong Chang Games when Germany’s Aljona Savchenko and Bruno Massot wore her costumes while setting a world record in the pairs free skate. “It felt sort of unreal,” McKinnon said of her costumes being part of a gold-medal winning performance. “I know that we made them. They were in our hands. But it was very much a dream come true.” She now dreams of further expanding her business off the ice by going further into bridal and evening wear, similar to that of Vera Wang, whom she calls a role model. Wang was“I want to say that I'm trying to follow in her footsteps,” McKinnon said. “She's a huge inspiration for me.”McKinnon was also inspired by, and a fan of, Madonna.She listened to"Like a Prayer" more than most over the last year or so while designing for and watching Glenn, and she hopes the next time she hears it is during an Olympic-medal winning performance -- which McKinnon and her team plan to watch together in Los Angeles. “I get so nervous when they're about to skate and you just never really know how it's going to go," she said."It's either we're so excited or we're so sad for them. So, yeah, I go through it all. Lots of tears. Happy tears. Sad tears.” Glenn will soon step back onto the grandest stage in sports. The world, and perhaps even Madonna herself, will be watching as she skates in the dress McKinnon created after putting on her headphones and hitting repeat. “I don't know how much skating Madonna watches, but I think she would love that dress,” McKinnon said. "I hope that she would, and that she would feel honored that somebody wants to skate to her song, and that we did a good job representing her.”2026 Milan Cortina Olympics
Olympics Figure Skating Costume Design Amber Glenn Madonna
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