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Typifying the genre-breaking tradition of the show, when costume designer Michele Clapton was asked to submit one episode of the series for a chance to be nominated for a prestigious Emmy, she surprised many by opting out of the expected path of showing the glamorous gowns that Lena Headey wears as Cersei, or the Alexander McQueen-inspired tunnel dress for Margaery. Nor did she want to showcase the lavish and outrageous designs that adorn the gluttonous trading city of Qarth, for example. Instead, she went for a less obvious approach, choosing the gritty locales and grubby clothing of series two episode ‘The Prince of Winterfell’.

‘There’s a big hole that fantasy often falls in,’ she said. ‘The costumes don’t resonate with the environment. We try to give the costumes a reality based on the land, climate and the food sources. I want you to be able to smell the costumes.’

Clapton prepares extensively for each season, eventually meeting up with her assistant designers about four months before shooting to decide on the direction for the forthcoming episodes, what new characters need to be included and what influences suit different groups. Medieval England was an obvious choice for the North, but others include the Bedouins look for Dothraki and Inuit tribes for the people Beyond the Wall.

Clapton told the LA Times, ‘It’s so exciting because we can almost go anywhere as long as it makes sense. If they live on a windy, rocky island, like the Greyjoys do, then they dress accordingly. They have costumes made of heavy, densely woven cloths that are waxed and painted with fish oil to help keep out the wind. Everything has a reason for being there.

‘We made all the costumes for the North from skins. For research, we looked at the Inuits and at Tibetan tribes – we try and look at peoples in different times in history to see how they would have dressed in that environment.

‘I also looked at Lascaux cave paintings in France; they have these wonderful animal paintings. We decided that every time they killed an animal, the hunters would have to paint an animal onto their costume. The better the hunter, the more covered in these drawings he would be, which I think visually is really strong. We’re always looking for ways to show who the leader is.’

Clapton is also allowed freedom to deviate from the book if needed, citing the example of King Renly, whose posse of rainbow warriors was excised from the screen as Clapton didn’t think it would translate from the book.

Instead, she is allowed to use her own and her team’s imagination. ‘From these discussions we will create mood boards for each new place, and I will start to draw for principals. We will also travel to Italy, Paris and Madrid to look at fabrics, as well as scout London – mainly Shepherds Bush, Chelsea Harbour and Berwick Street.’

After weeks of research, she locates to the workrooms, home to her cutters, markers and armourers. She prefers to make as much of the clothing and items in-house as possible because it is ‘practical and much more fulfilling’.

‘We have weavers, embroiderers and printers, so a lot of costumes are created from scratch,’ Clapton added. ‘Craster’s wives’ costumes, for instance, were woven from raffia, rabbit skin and feathers, which were then aged in our breakdown rooms. Likewise, Daenerys Dothraki’s costume was woven in-house. Each season we try to hire less costumes, although we sometimes have to commission some extras’ costumes to be made outside of the workroom due to time and numbers, but we still try to finish them on site.’

From there, it’s on to filming. Despite the hard work that’s gone into creating these costumes, many of them blend into the background, perversely hidden from your eyes, despite the blood and tears of craftwork that has gone into them. Filming also possesses a whole new host of challenges for Clapton. ‘One big thing is: the children keep growing! I mean, in all ways: outwards and upwards! But that aside, sometimes you don’t get to see the actor until quite close to shooting and, at that point, we are already quite a long way with the armour. With Brienne, for instance, she is a woman but we want to mistake her for a man; however, no matter what you do, women have hips. We just started making the lines on the armour go away from her waist and slowly she began to look more masculine; at the same time, the armour also had to be functional.’

As well as the costumes, the show’s hair designer, Kevin Alexander, inspired some of the other big visual talking points in the series.

Around 30 wigs are used in the show, with Emilia Clarke, Lena Headey, Carice van Houten and Natalie Dormer all wearing hairpieces that cost around $7,000 each, with hair sourced from India and Russia. Because of the hefty price tags, the wigs are washed, styled and indulged in glamorous products every few days.

Sophie Turner, who plays Sansa, has blonde hair in real life, but because she was only a teenager it was decided that they didn’t want to use peroxide on her – preferring instead to use around four different watercolour shades – which last around 10 days and need to be touched up constantly.

Jack Gleeson, who has naturally dark hair, needs his hair touched up daily, as well as kept short, as it makes him look younger for the role of evil young king Joffrey, who has blond Lannister locks.

Not everything is so glamorous and styled, however – multiple product brands, like Lee Stafford, VO5 Matte Clay, Fudge and Jonathan Dirt, are used for the peasant look, as well as Vaseline, and dirt powder, which is incidentally a real product.

Talking about dirtying up a garment, Clapton said, ‘If it takes three days to make a costume, it then takes another three days to destroy it and break it. After the actors have worn it a few days in the sun it gets even better – nice and ripe!’

Game of Thrones doesn’t look like any other fantasy epic, and Clapton puts this down to her refusal to ditch her work ethic. The ageing and breaking-down process of the costumes may be the most time-consuming process at work, but it is what makes the show so different from others that have preceded it.

‘When you are shooting in HD, breaking down a costume can’t be done too quickly or it will show,’ Clapton explained to the Hollywood Reporter. ‘You spend two weeks breaking down, patching, dying, repatching. Then you trash it, age it, then trash it again and repair. You can’t just stick a couple of patches on it and spray it with dirt because that is exactly what it will look like on HD televisions.’