Taylor Swift has always been a storyteller, but her new chapter brightens brighter lights — literally. As a prelude to her upcoming 12th studio album, The Life of a Showgirl, the singer released images redañating her as a contemporary Vegas icon. Wearing a silver, bejeweled Bob Mackie outfit, complete with feathers and a showy headdress, a nod to the great days of showgirls, in images by noted duo Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott, for the shots.

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Mackie, whose iconic designs have outfitted legends ranging from Cher to Tina Turner, first designed it for the Las Vegas revue Jubilee! in the early ’80s. The dress’s re-emergence, many years later and on one of popular music’s greatest icons, is a full-circle cultural reference. As Mackie told us, though shocked by the appropriation of his work, he called Swift’s reworking a brilliant one, saying of her, “She’s a grown-up now,” a reference to how her growth is reminiscent of his own eternal sense of ravishing.

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Swift’s decision to act like a showgirl is not merely fashionable; it’s a symbol of things. Her career for a long time waltzed between spectacle and sincerity, and this period marries both. Channeling Mackie’s flamboyant designs, it’s a tribute to the tradition of performance, womanhood, and survival that characterizes showbiz. The Life of a Showgirl appears set to be less of a record and more of a work of art, one of its kind; it repositions Swift both as narrator and star of her own great revue.