The English National Ballet

The English National Ballet has 64 dancers from 20 countries of which some come from as far away as Australia, China, Japan, New Zealand and Canada.

The dancers’ day starts at 10:30 am with ballet class and they can be in the theatre as late as 11pm after a long performance. They dance for an average of 2032 hours a year.

The English National Ballet’s dancers used 3546 pairs of pointe shoes in 2003.

Each female dancer gets an allowance of up to 10 pairs of pointe shoes per month.

Every time a dancer jumps on pointe, three times her body weight is carried on the tip of her big toe.

The Company uses one and a half miles of ballet shoe ribbon per year.

The dancers use up to 105 pairs of false eyelashes a year.

Four of the principal dancers have had babies in the last few years. They all continued dancing and one was still performing as a swan while she was five months pregnant.

Every tutu uses 10-12 metres of fabric and there are between 10 and 12 layers of net in the skirt.

Each tutu takes over 40 hours to maker and they are all made by hand.

The Company tours with 3 washing machines to wash the costumes that can be washed such as skirts, tights and pants.

50-60 pairs of men’s tights are used in every performance, which are washed every night.

The company gives an average of 140 performances per year.

More than 300,000 people have seen English National Ballet’s production of Swan Lake.