Frank Herbert’s classic 1965 sci-fi novel “Dune” is my favorite book. The book is considered to be to Sci-Fi, what Lord of the Rings is to fantasy. There have been multiple attempts to adapt Dune, always with mixed results. The following figures are my designs of the world of Dune. I only used the literary descriptions from the original Frank Herbert books of the characters, costumes and colors for my designs.

House Atreides was one of the most powerful major noble families in the the Landsraad. Lead by Duke Leto, the family was put in charge of the planet Arrakis as part of plot between the Padishah Emperor and House Harkonnen. The home of the house, before Arrakis, was the planet Caladan. The house’s symbol is a Hawk and it’s colors are Green and Black with Red accents.

Duke Leto Atreides, Head of House Atreides

Description from novel:

“The Duke was tall, olive-skinned. His thin face held harsh angles warmed only by deep gray eyes.”

“There was woodsmoke in the gray of his eyes, but the face was predatory: thin, full of sharp angles and planes.”

Lady Jessica Atreides, Ducal concubine and Bene Gesserit Sister

Description from novel:

“The face was oval under a cap of hair the color of polished bronze. Her eyes were set wide, as green and clear as the morning skies of Caladan. The nose was small, the mouth wide and generous. Her figure was good but scant: tall and with its curves gone to slimness.”

Paul Atreides, Ducal heir

Description from novel:

“face oval like Jessica’s, but strong bones . . . hair: the Duke’s black-black but with browline of the maternal grandfather who cannot be named, and that thin, disdainful nose; shape of directly staring green eyes”

Thufir Hawat, Mentat and Master of Assassins

Description from novel:

“His left leg was injured in those years.”

“[his eyes where] two pools of alertness in a dark and deeply seamed face.”

“[his age] showed in the rheumy shine of the brow and eyes, in the cheeks racked and burned by exotic weathers, in the rounded curve of the shoulders and the thin set of his lips with the cranberry-colored stain of sapho juice.”

Gurney Halleck, troubadour warrior

Description from novel:

“the ugly lump of a man, noting the glass-splinter eyes with their gleam of savage understanding. Halleck’s wispy blond hair trailed across barren spots on his head. His wide mouth was twisted into a pleasant sneer, and the scar of the inkvine whip slashed across his jawline seemed to move with a life of its own. His whole air was of casual, shoulder-set capability.”

Dr. Wellington Yueh, Suk Doctor of House Atreides

Description from novel:

“stick figure standing several paces away, took in at a glance the wrinkled black clothing, the square block of a head with purple lips and drooping mustache, the diamond tattoo of Imperial Conditioning on his forehead, the long black hair caught in the Suk School ‘s silver ring at the left shoulder”

Duncan Idaho, Sword Master for House Atreides

Description from novel:

“[there stood Duncan in] glittering dress uniform, flat face unreadable, the curling black hair neatly combed.”

Padishah Emperor Shaddam Corrino IV, Emperor of the known universe.

From the novel:

“The Emperor stood poised, waiting — a slim, elegant figure in a gray Sardaukar uniform with silver and gold trim. His thin face and cold eyes reminded the Baron of the Duke Leto long dead. There was that same look of the predatory bird. But the Emperor’s hair was red, not black, and most of that hair was concealed by a Burseg’s ebon helmet with the Imperial crest in gold upon its crown.”

The Emperor look is designed to have a military look, as the book describes, but with a Middle Eastern flare, due to the subtext of the Dune novel for the Middle East. The Emperor is dressed in the colors of house Corrino, Crimson Red, and is adorned with the house seal, the Golden Lion. The Emperor comes with ceremonial curved golden dagger.

Princess Irulan Corrino, daughter of the Padishah Emperor

From the novel:

“And among the lackeys stood one of the Emperor’s daughters, the Princess Irulan, a woman they said was being trained in the deepest of the Bene Gesserit ways, destined to be a Reverend Mother. She was tall, blonde, face of chiseled beauty, green eyes that looked past and through him.”

Irulan comes in regal imperial gown in the house color of crimson. She wears a simple golden crown, but is adorned with the golden head frame.

Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam, Bene Gesserit Truthsayer

From the novel:

“The old woman was a witch shadow – hair like matted spiderwebs, hooded ’round darkness of features, eyes like glittering jewels.” And “she has scrawny hands and a black aba robe with drawn hood.” And “Her face peered out of the hood like a witch caricature – sunken cheeks and eyes, an overlong nose, skin mottled and with protruding veins.”

The Reverend Mother is wearing the black robes, as described in the book. She comes slumped and hunched over with interchangeable hands; one hand in a plain shriveled hand & the other holds the green box of pain to test young Paul Atreides.

House Harkonnen was another of the Major Houses in the Imperium. The ruled from the industrialized planet of Geidi Prime. They were infamous for their brutality and malevolence. They entered into a secret alliance with House Corrino to undermine House Atreides. The house symbol was the griffin and their colors were blue and black with red accents.

Baron Vladimir Harkonnen

Description from novel:

“Grossly and immensely fat. And with subtle bulges beneath the folds of his dark robes to reveal that all this fat was sustained partly by portable suspensors harnessed to his flesh.

“fat cheeks were two cherubic mounds beneath spider-black eyes.”

“His jowls bobbed up and down; the suspensors jiggled and shifted beneath his orange robe.”

Piter de Vries

Description from novel:

“His eyes were the blue-within-blue that marks all addicted to spice.”

“tall, slender, with something suggesting effeminancy.”

Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen

Description from novel:

“His dark hair was dressed in close ringlets that seemed incongruously gay above sullen eyes. He wore a tight-fitting black tunic and snug trousers with a suggestion of bell at the bottom. Soft-soled slippers covered his small feet.”

“the black glove and the long knife in his right hand, the white glove and the short knife in his left hand.”

Glossu Rabban Harkonnen

Description from novel:

“low built, gross of face and body, with the Harkonnen paternal line’s narrow-set eyes and bulge of shoulders. There was yet some rigidity in his fat”

The Freman are the indigenous people of the harsh desert planet Arrakis. Their tough surroundings lead the them developing into quite a resourceful and tough people. They lived in communities called sietches. They wore suits that reclaimed the body’s water waste, called stillsuits. Their prized weapon was the Crysknife, made from the tooth of a sandworm. They were an integral part of Muad’Dib’s galactic jihad.

To read more about how I designed the Stillsuit and other Freman technology see the bottom of the page.

Paul Muad’Dib, Atreides Emperor , the Kwisatz Haderach, Usul, The Preacher

Description from Novel:

I kept with the descriptions given of the younger Paul and just made him older looking.

Stilgar Ben Fifrawi, Naib of Sietch Tabr

Description from Novel:

“thin nose and full-lipped mouth in a glistening black beard”

Chani Atreides, wife and concubine of Muad’Dib

Description from Novel:

“elfin face, black pits of eyes.” She “moves like a gazelle.”

Freman Fedaykin, elite bodyguard of Muad’Dib

Description from Novel:

There is no real description given in the novel, I just thought it would be fun to make the figure.

Freman Wormrider

Description from Novel:

There is no real description given in the novel, I just thought it would be fun to make the figure.

The biggest problem with the Freman was the stillsuit design. I must admit that the production design in David Lynch’s Dune by Anthony Masters (Lawrence of Arabia & 2001 a Space Odyssey) is among some of my favorite production design and the still suit is one of my favorite costumes in film history. I hated the Sci Fi channel’s stillsuits. According to the book Dune the stillsuits are gray and the character Kynes describes chest straps, neck fittings, nose tubes, thigh and arm pads for processing the reclaimed water. My design includes all of those components. I added the flared boots because