Among others she was a wardrobe mistress at the "Ateliers du Costume" under the direction of Danièle Boutard in Paris.
Beginning in 1990 she obtained free engagements as a costume designer at the Bavarian Television for the documentary films Die Geschichte der Post (The History of the Mail) and the French language class Bon Courage.
The costumes were reconstructed by Nicolai following period sketches from the Friderica Derra de Moroda dance archive of the University of Salzburg.
In 2008 she designed the costumes for the creation of the children's opera In the Shade of the Mulberry Tree by Edward Rushton [de]; Her "consistent costumes“ were part of a mediterranean idyll into which the director Aglaja Nicolet put the staging.
She designed for the Salzburg Festival 2013 the costumes for a staging of the Mozart opera Die Entführung aus dem Serail in a version for children.
She designed the debutants' dirndl aprons with Redouté roses for the Salzburg Festival Ball at the end of August 2013.