Front view and close-up of Kevin's salmon hide vest. It is real salmon skin tanned as durable as shoe leather as were the sea bass skins, the mahi-mahi and tuna that we used throughout the movie on other costumes.

John had specified to me the parameters of the kind of vest he wanted (waist length; made up of small pieces), then it was up to me. After meeting Kevin, taking his measurements and sizing up his physique, I composed the size, shape and psychological placement of the pieces to best show off his hero shoulders and pecs leading down to his trim waist. As seen in the close-up there is a distinctive pattern of hand-stitching that connects all the pieces. Once I invented the first sample and after it was approved by Kevin and John, my tailors had to make sixteen multiples of the same vest to last for the duration of the filming. We always made dozens of identical multiples of each of Kevin's costumes so we would have fresh changes for him during the days of continual acting in the water or replacements for those vests destroyed in the course of stunts.

My traditionally trained tailors were certainly more at home with a bolt of wool and three-piece suits rather than sinew and fish hides, but they all rose admirably to the challenge.