Death Bunny

Inspiration piece:

http://www.skullspiration.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Skull-salt-and-pepper-shakers-3.jpg

This is for playboy bunny contest/party at D*C.  I have fuzzy pink bunny years I bought years ago, a black corset, and a black tulle skirt already.  I'm going to see about re-doing the skirt, as I think it's a little too long, plus I want to use an elasticized waist instead of the tying system it has currently.

A friend shared a site earlier this year that had some skull-y things, including a scarf I liked that you got for free if you ordered X amount of stuff.  Well, I liked some tall stockings/hose that were black with pink crossed bones on them so.... then I learned about the contest/party, looked at the hose, remembered the ears I have and the salt-and-pepper shakers, and voila!

These shakers have the bunnies wearing ties -- I'll have to think about whether I want to do this type of tie or not. I was thinking I'd like to make a standing collar with a mantle, so a tie could be worked into it without too much difficulty...maybe.  We'll see what happens :D

I'll also need to make a mask -- domino/half mask type.

Hm, do I need a wig? Probably not. Maybe just put my hair up in a bun...

My costume will be more black than pink, but I think it will be cute, and definitely fun.

Warhammer 40K - Rogue Trader

Seriously considering doing a Rogue Trader, likely based on Lady Sun Lee. I guess I need to look at more pictures of Rogue Traders, armor, etc., since the picture I have of her only shows the front and that not down to the feet.

Found these at Goodwill today, for $2:

These are little kid shin guards. Actually, they're pretty short, even on my forearms, but I can always add extension materials.  They aren't the same shape as the ones in the picture but I like that they're padded, so I'll make a cover for them.  Not craft foam if I can help it, since I don't have any, but we'll see, when the time comes.

I was hoping for more used sports equipment (like shoulders and elbows), but no luck this time.  Considered a pair of ski boots for $7 because they were nice and bulky and armor-like, but couldn't stand how rigid the soles are.

Inspiration piece for Lady Sun Lee:

Oh, and for no reason at all, got this too:

Faux leather but has a nice hand for all that, and only $5. I'm sure it'll come in handy for something.

Sleeve Progress

Gotten a little further on sleeves for Snow Queen. Mostly I work on it as a break from doing other things, so it'll take a while to make, especially over the next few weeks. I'm also working on curtains for the bedroom (yes, still), as well as rearranging things all over the place. And the porch has been pretty much eating my time up in large chunks but I think I'm finally done with that for a bit. Well, except for decorating the tree, but that can wait.

Anyway, here's a picture!

The lower part of the sleeve is rows of lace sewn together. I then added a row onto the bottom of the upper half of the sleeve. Then I made the snowflakes.

Well, then I made some small pleats while attaching the lower and upper halves.

These are mostly from new materials. I found a place online for the lace at a good price, and the fabric was on sale at JoAnn's.

The snowflakes are made from pieces I cut off while getting the lace matched up for the long cuffs, so a reduction in waste there.  They're beaded with blue glass rocaille and bugle beads, and also white pearl beads. The glass ones I bought new last year, the "pearls" I bought new as well, back when I was doing a lot of pearling in the SCA.

***

I wanted to have a coat with this, but then the dress would be hidden -- okay in a costume contest where you can walk around, take off the coat, and walk some more, but terrible for a hall costume.

I also thought it would be nice if I could wear the coat outside of a convention so...what I'm going to try to do is make a sleeveless coat/robe that I can attach sleeves to for actual outdoor wear. I have a lovely plush grey velour and also some white fake fur that I've been using for extra warmth in the bedroom, which should look great!

***

Originally I was going to have a blue skirt and in fact it's mostly done. But as I continued to do research I realized that the bluer winter beings like Snegurochka are a winter-into-spring theme. I want to go icier, so the deeper, more intense blue is now out. No worries, I'll wear that skirt with something else!

I have another option now -- my first wedding dress. I had it kicking around because I was thinking I'd remake it into something else and never got around to it. I think it'll be a fine base for the snow queen, and the light blue organza looks good over it. Now I have to decide if I want to keep the train or not...

Quick Post on Snow Queen

Wanted a change of pace last night, so I started work on sleeves for Snow Queen.  Yeah, Dragon Con is a ways from now, but these are going to take a little while to make...

The straight edges go fairly quickly, but futzing with joining the pointed ends takes a little longer. Liking the look so far!

Organizing a Costume

Still a work in progress, and of course it depends on what the pieces are for a given costume, but I found that bagging and/or hanging the accessories together before going to Dragon Con made it easier for me to keep track of all the parts.  Below is a hanger with clips with my Miskatonic U accessories -- socks on one clip, pom poms on the other, and pony tails hung on the hook part. I took it to Dragon Con this way too, as I had no idea how to pack crin without crushing it and my brain was working on too many projects to figure it out. I should probably go through my empty boxes and find one the right size, but for now it gets hung up.

Before D*C, I had it hanging next to the cheerleader outfit, and shoes on the floor. Easy to eyeball and see if anything's missing.

Other costumes had multiple small things, so I put them in one of those zippered bags that sheets and pillow cases sometimes come in. Those are great! Clear, sturdy, and usually have a hanger hook on them so you can hang it with the costume.

Overall, this worked well for me.

This didn't work in the case of my wig for Batgirl (which got left behind), but I think that was because even though I had it grouped with the costume, it wasn't hanging up.  The floor was a bit chaotic and I think it blended in with the chaos.  So I'll have to work on a better staging area for next time.

Currently I am working on putting nearly all the wigs in one place in the house. I think I only need to find homes for a couple more -- good thing I don't have a ton of them... I have a few hats in that spot too, so perhaps I'll move the hats elsewhere, in order to get all the wigs in one place.

A Bit of New Fabric

Friday, went shopping at JoAnn's with my 50% off all thread coupon and ended up buying some fabric too -- 50% off or more, please and thank you.

- Silver sequin fabric -- real, sewn-on sequins, not the glued on dots.  Hoping to make that into Agent May's dress from Season 2 Episode "Face My Enemy".

 - Faux black leather from the discounted area, all of which was on additional sale discount, for making Agent May vest in the style of Season 1 (she has a couple of them). Not going to go crazy "authentic", but I felt the jacket vest should be somewhat fitted, standing collar, longer line than anything I've seen so far, and zip up the front.

- Slinky silver fabric with spider web pattern. Um, just because.

Agent May's Boots and Cyclops' Shoes

Found boots for Agent May, at JC Penney:

I missed the really good sale ($69.99) but still got them for $99.99 -- regular price is $115.  They look like boots Agent May would wear (she has at least two pair in Season 1, one low, one knee-high).

I don't like single-use items much, and I wanted boots with leather uppers. My feet are hard to fit, so I need shoes that I can break in -- that means real leather. I'll be able to wear these boots for every day, not just for a few hours. They were a little tight at first, but after walking around in them for about 10 minutes, maybe less, they warmed up and started the re-shaping process to fit me better.


That's actually a wee problem with the yellow shoes I got for the Cyclops -- faux leather, and just a tiny bit of pinch. But they have a functional buckle across the bridge, so I'm considering modifying them -- open the solid part, add in fabric, and then the buckle will have a real function.  Also, I'm going to try to make buckle covers for the real buckle, that will make them look like the X-Men buckle; just a nice little extra detail.

Cyclops Belt

Looking at different options for Cyclops' belt. Found this while looking to see if wide belts were a 1950s thing (they were):

I like the idea of the sash, because I was trying to figure out how to deal with Cyclops wearing a blue body suit with yellow briefs.  Thinking I can just subsume those into a wide belt or sash.  The sash would do the job of carrying the yellow downward.

Costuming and Environmental Costs

Well, that's a tough one.  If you get into certain types of costuming, like makeup or wigs for instance, you want to use new cosmetics and it's difficult to get used wigs that are still in good shape, so those are usually new as well. This is one of the reasons I'm happy when I can use materials I already have, or can get used stuff for my projects.

There's a cost to anything you choose to do, wear, eat.  For instance, we used to travel across the valley nearly every week for choir practice, which you would think was better than driving to Dragon Con, which is about 2,000 miles round-trip for us.  But in fact we drove more miles going to the weekly local gathering.  Even better from some environmentalists' view would be to do neither, of course.

I really enjoy the creative outlet of costuming, which has given me more enthusiasm and energy for creating and making in general, so more things are getting done close to home as well.

I was thinking about the costs as I was getting dressed a few days back, and realized the shirt I was putting on was probably 20 years old.  Yes, I have quite a few tops that age, and a few sweaters that are even older, and some skirts in the same range. Only one or two pair of slacks, the good ones.... everything else usually only lasts 5-10 years. Some clothing I don't know the age of because I got them from my mom or the local clothing swap. Shoes and undies I buy or make new.

So, that helps balance things a little. I used to not go to cons because I went camping instead, which seemed to me to be lower impact, and I got to hang out with friends and do fun things, but as the Society has matured, it has gotten higher maintenance, at least at large events like Pennsic, so the difference gets a little smaller between large events and a convention.  We are always balancing between one choice and another -- I think probably what's most important is acknowledging what you're doing, what the effect is, rather than trying to reason things away.

 I'd like to go to D*C again, and at the moment that's what we're planning on for 2015.  We also would like to go to a kung fu seminar in FL next spring possibly...likely that would be driving down with some other folks.  And my uncle C has been bugging my mom about when I'm coming out again. *sigh*

Well, so we're working on fixing up the barn and carriage house, setting up a greenhouse, winterizing the house porch, and adding some creative insulation -- the house is fully insulated, but it was still effing cold during the worst part of the winter, so I'll be making cushioned half-walls to put where possible on outer walls.  These will mostly be filled with spare comforters and blankets, maybe some off-season clothing, or fabric that hasn't yet been made into things. I'll also be making wall hangings for a few walls. I'll try to post pics of those things here -- it isn't clothing, but it is sewing, so I guess that counts.

And starting research into the possibility of solar power.  I'm also going to get back into research about hugel kulture and trying to do some of that here. If we're going to use fossil fuels to travel, then we need to use less of them at home.

Shoes for Cyclops and...

These are the shoes I got for the Rockabilly X-Men Cyclops costume.

http://www.heels.com/womens-shoes/lucca-yellow.html

I don't expect to do much more on this costume for a while, but I saw the shoes when they were on sale, and when opportunity knocks....

The sunglasses should be coming sometime in the next few weeks.  I'll be keeping everything together with the dress that I'll be re-tailoring, so I can find it all next year.  Still haven't picked the spot in the house for doing this -- right now everything's in the living room but that won't do over the holidays.

***

Separately, I have some cool gold pintucked fabric that I bought ages ago, and I've been contemplating what to do with it. Since we moved to our new house, I've been working away at using existing materials, to reduce the amount of fabric in storage (in theory), decorate and insulate the house, and have more new clothing to wear.  Well, and now more costumes, apparently.  I did have to buy some fabric this year, especially for Shiny, but am going to try to do less of that this coming year.

I'm contemplating doing a phoenix costume, inspired by the mythical creature, not the Marvel comics character.  The colors we're most used to in the West are red and gold, but there are other options...I'm thinking this gold fabric would make a splendid gold coat though. Fitted in the body, with a nice big flared skirt.

And I'm thinking of making a hat to go with it. And a standing collar.  Just putting these bits down for future reference, since I don't have time to do anything about it right now.

***

I'll also be working on the Snow/Winter Queen over the next year.  I'll see if I can put up some photos of what I have so far; not sure when that will happen.

Dragon Con 2015 Rockabilly X-Men Update

Okay, so opted for Cyclops instead of Dark Phoenix. Ordered some cool sunglasses -- will probably have to paint the frames, but they're cat eye and the lenses are a firey red/gold.

I have a blue dress that should work, with tailoring, and can still use the gold tights.

Need:
- yellow/gold shoes
- red belt
- yellow/gold gloves
- maybe a gold sash for that splash of yellow in the middle?

I can style my own hair instead of a wig because Cyclops is a brunette.

***

I might still do a Dark Phoenix, but go a little more Chinese than I was planning before -- altho' the cheongsam was popular in the 50s, interesting enough...

Agent Melinda May - D*C 2015

My patches came today, and they're perfect!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/261520206896?_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

She makes them, so give enough time in your schedule to make sure they get to you in time for whatever you might want them.

These are the only ones I could find that are the correct color for Agent May. Strange, you'd think Marvel would offer a full selection, but not so much.  So yay for this lady and her programmable sewing machine!

Rockabilly Hair

"Bangs" for people with long hair:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FO3QkCTsb8

Dragon Con 2015 - Dark Phoenix, for Rockabilly X-Men

I asked for Dark Phoenix in the Rockabilly X-Men group partly because I like the Phoenix and partly because I have a wig that I think will work for that. As I learn more about Rockabilly, I may change my mind and use a different wig...good thing I have options, eh?

Not going to be making the dress any time soon -- I have other things to do first, and as I'm getting more active doing kung fu, my figure is likely to change a little over the winter as well.  But I figured it couldn't hurt to poke around online....

I started with looking for pictures of wiggle dresses, and then added "red" and "phoenix", and found some modern Chinese wedding dresses -- and thought, a Chinese phoenix would be cool.  Friend L thought it would be cool to do Chinese Rockabilly so...

Above dress is found here: http://modernqipao.com/product/sleeveless-red-phoenix-embroidered-long-lace-qipao-chinese-bridal-dress-mermaid-evening-gown/

I also saw some variations on having an opening below the collar, usually teardrop or triangular, and some dresses are open on the upper back.  Some are all of one fabric and some have filmy/lacy fabric across the shoulders.  And a few do an open standing collar thing but I can't find the one I saw that reminded me a touch of Jean Grey from the movie.

The group is sharing pictures and patterns for different looks from the 1950s and there are a few choices in types of dress, not just the wiggle dress. It's been interesting to see what folks are sharing -- I remember a few of those dresses from patterns my mom had, and I realized that in college I had a red and white gingham that would have fit the bill. Long gone, of course.

Anyway, just for fun I did a search for Chinese Rockabilly, and found this:

http://notyourchinagirl.com/post/1950s_Rockabilly_Culture_in_China

Wow.

Anyway! The Chinese wedding dresses are lovely but a little bit of money -- not that fabric is free either -- but more importantly, how can I be sure a store-bought dress will fit me properly? So I found a lace cheongsam-like shirt with a phoenix embroidered on it on eBay and bid on one -- it'll be arriving in a few weeks.  When I get to actually making the dress I can decide then if I'll incorporate the whole shirt or applique the phoenix alone onto the garment.

I still need to decide if I'm going with the straight/more fitted skirt or more flared like a lot of Rockabilly seems to be -- if the latter, I can always put the phoenix on the skirt (instead of a poodle!).

Meantime, I have a dress I made but don't want to keep as-is, so that might get used for making the Phoenix dress. And I have gold tights!  I'm putting all the possibles together now and will hang them with my other projects so I can find them when it's time to get to work on this.

Dragon Con 2014 - Final Part (3 of 3)

So, more generally, a few more things...

1) New vs Used/Extant -- It can definitely be argued that some of the latter should actually be labeled as New, if I bought them new.  I put some of those types of things (mostly fabric) under Used/Extant because I used to shop more actively and built up a good-sized stash, some of which has been with me for years, so it just doesn't feel new I guess.  Some of it was bought for projects that didn't happen, some as staple fabrics (SCA people generally need white linen, for instance), and all of it on sale (of course!).  However it's labeled, it's been great getting some things out of the stash, making things, emptying partial spools of thread, etc.

2) Wearability -- One of my personal rules is you have to be able to move, preferably unhindered. My simple description for this is "I wear clothes I can kick in." -- I practice kung fu, hence the kicking reference.

I'm a little concerned about that with one of next year's projects, but this year every one of my outfits passed the test.

3) Every one of my costumes must have at least one thing that isn't new, and preferably more. And I mean really not new, as opposed to unused fabric I've had around for a while.  Not only does this (usually) keep the cost down, but it's better for the environment.  Conventions, like most large-scale human gatherings, aren't good for the environment, but that's no reason to completely give up on personal responsibility. My humble opinion, of course.

Dragon Con 2014 Review - Part 2

3) Steampunk Ozma (Saturday Night Group)

i) New Materials
- Underbust corset from Corset Story (on sale, of course), hook & eye fancy closures

ii) Used/Extant Materials
- Italian surcoat/cotta, cotton gauze dress, petticoat, gold spray paint, 2 rectangular doilies, layered lace cuffs, interfacing scrap, braid trim, buttons, vest,  curtain swags, safety pins, socks, shoes, undies, 2 brooches, sequins (really large specialty ones with a sort of cog-like look), red paint, silk flowers, gold trim, twill tape, ivory triangular trim, narrow banding, hot glue, ME pants (Lyle's, because I can't find mine for some reason), winingas (leg wraps)

Review:

I think this project used the least new materials. The cotta was one I made years ago and wore a few times before going on to other styles -- plus I think I'd given away parts of the outfit...so nice to be wearing it again, as I love the fabric!  The sequins/spangles are from the box of these I got from Barbara Geoffroy's stash, and are a fun accent on the dags.

The vest I'd made as an experiment and while it didn't work the way I'd originally wanted it to, it's fine with the new closures. I'll want to tweak the fit on it over the winter, but it did the job for this costume group.  The gauze dress (third hand!) was easy to remake into a skirt, and safety pins worked to gather the skirts up in front and to attach the used curtain swags. My thanks to Suzi Day for the dress and the swags :)

The little hat was a fun project -- I made the cap base myself from interfacing scrap and some of the Italian cotta's leftover scrap, braided trim was left over from some project, as was some of the gold trim for the "crown".  The silk flowers were peonies originally, that I'd gotten at a swap in town. I took a couple of them apart, used some of the black spray paint from the Batgirl costume to paint the stamens and pistils, used some old red acrylic paint, very slightly watered down to paint the petals. Needed two coats of red, plus I did a light spritz with some matte acrylic spray coating (I've had that around for years for protecting calligraphy and some other things).

I spray-painted the doilies gold -- they have an uneven, sort of aged look to them because the can was defective and leaked like crazy. Kinda cool-looking, but glad I was able to use up that can on them so I could finally get rid of the can. The lace cuffs are off another dress I'd made and worn in college, and the doilies are from Barbara Geoffroy's Stash (BGS). The buttons are from a project that didn't happen. The twill is from stock (things you should have if you sew), and the triangular lace trim is left over from another project.

I was supposed to make spats from the cotta material and one of the doilies but forgot the bag at home. Fortunately I was able to borrow winingas from a friend when we stayed at our friends' place in NJ on the way to the con, and they were great. I still want to make the spats, of course -- imagine coordinating fabric from head to toe!

This was pretty easy to put together, even with making up parts of the coat pattern (the bodice was from a "steampunk bolero jacket pattern, but the collar, sleeve caps and tails were me). Easy to get into, although if I'm going to hitch up the skirts again I think I'll come up with a different system.

Another good outfit, if not super shiny or super impressive.

4) My Demon Pony (solo) - Sorry, no picture. Will try to get one at some point.

i) New Materials
- Medium purple linen, blue and clear seed beads, thread, barrette, wig, My Little Demon pony (stuffed toy pony with fins and tentacles), socks, shoes

ii) Used/Extant Materials
-  Lavender/light mauve(?) matte satin dress (Thanks again, Suzi D), white curtains, narrow lace trim, hook & eye, Purple jacket, beaded flower, sequins, undies, pink top (instead of a bra), white blouse, shoes, elastic, 1970s vintage trim

Review:
Wore this on my own, during the day. Polyester jacket was too warm so I took it off when we went shopping -- I'd cut it short and made it into a bolero-style but left the sleeves long, something I think I'll change... I'd bought shoes but I need to try out padding or something to make them a little more comfortable, so I left those at home and wore practical flats.

The major new material use was the medium purple linen -- I'd bought it for making a Steampunk outfit, then was afraid to use it because the type of weave is more delicate than I wanted to deal with for a long skirt.  As a shorter skirt that's partly protect by an overskirt, I had more confidence in finally using it.  And as I worked with it, I realized it was pretty sturdy, so I used it for smaller ruffles, which helped to tie the overskirt, jacket, and fascinator together.  You can't see the curtains because those are the foundation layer for the ruffle skirt and underslip for the overskirt.

The blouse from my mother I rarely wore because it was very nice and also long-sleeved. I usually roll up long sleeves, which isn't nice to do to a fancy-ish blouse.  But now it's short-sleeved ;)

Fascinator was pretty easy to make and works well. Yay!

Overall, I'm okay with this one, although I have more work to do. The jacket sleeves need shortening, and I still have some beading do so on the back of the skirt. Also, I want to make a collar for the pony with my info on it in case I lose track of it, and maybe a shoulder perch so I can have my hands free.  

5) Miskatonic Cheerleader costume (Sunday Night Group)

i) New Materials
- Top and skirt ordered custom from GT Sportswear, super wearable and durable
- Socks, from a specialty online store (small business)
- Spanx-like undies - can be worn with other dark outfits as needed (Target)
- Cyberlocks "dreads" - Mostly new materials through small online businesses (the tubey stuff), some ribbon new from JoAnn's
- Pom poms

ii) Used/Extant Materials
- Bra - already had suitable one
- Shoes -- a pair of Fevue's (martial arts shoes) from my kung fu stuff
- "Dreads" - some ribbon from existing stock (have a lot of skinny ribbon from doing other crafts over the years), and two hair elastics

Review:
Comfortable, wearable, pretty quick change. Makeup was minimal, altho' maybe I should have a little more next time... Almost all new, except for the hair elastics, bra and sneakers. Not great on sustainability scale, altho' I kind of count supporting smaller businesses (part of the economic side of sustainability).

Dragon Con 2014 Review - Part I

Review of costumes from Dragon Con 2014

***
NOTE for 2015: Try to include a hand fan somehow, whether in a purse or leg sheath, with as many of the costumes as possible -- Marriott is warm with lots of people wandering around the Pulse area in the evening. There's a limit to how much I'm willing to suffer for my art -- I've been in heavy armor in August, so been there, done that...
***

Five outfits for this convention.  Going to do more than one post, as each item will get a bit of a breakdown and it's going to be a bit of writing...

1) Shiny (Thursday Night Group) -- I'm the first one on the left. Photo by Ryan Scott Sarver.

i) Mostly new materials for the hat, dress, body suit, sleeves, and adhesive bra. This includes netted, sequined, and specialty netted fabrics, rhinestones (for bra, shoes, and body), faceted beads, green seed beads, glue dots, Aleene's fabric glue, earrings, metal corner fittings, fiber optic fountain and fiber optic barrettes, wig, and makeup

ii) Used/Extant Materials:
an old shirt as the foundation for the dress, elastic from an old friend's supplies for the sleeves, pearls were either from her or my extant supplies, most of the thread, shoes (both the pair I was trying to rhinestone and the pair I ended up wearing at the con), painters tape and posterboard paper scraps (kung fu adventure week supply leftovers), foam board scraps, hot glue (rescued some glue from the neighbor's old greenhouse), and silver sparkly socks (thermal socks my mother gave me), buttons at sleeve cuffs, interfacing scrap

Review:
Mostly comfortable and wearable. Longest part to do was makeup, and I should have used the bindi glue instead of relying on the adhesive the body rhinestones had on them -- sweated half the forehead ones off. Also, one would have thought the fully adhesive-backed bra would stay on securely, but I'm thinking maybe the weight of the rhinestones and beads might have been too much for it, even though I only did the upper half of the cups.  Fortunately I'd made big long fluffy sleeves, so I just pulled the side of one of them over the bra, hooked it onto some of the beads and tacked it to the bodice.  Not great, but at least I wasn't exposed... *sigh*   And because I was running late I didn't have time to try to put  setting powder on, so my makeup didn't last as well as I would have liked, and no time to apply nails.  We'd gotten stuck in hideous traffic -- from arriving in Atlanta to finally getting into our hotel room was 3 hrs. Oy. So I had about 20 minutes to get dressed...

That aside, all the fiber optics worked, the hat actually worked (fit, design, balance). I'm glad I had a backup plan of my plain white wedges when I figured out I wouldn't have time to finish the other shoes (among other things!).  And people really liked the costume. Quite a few pics before I even met up with the rest of the group, and many comments of "Awesome!", plus startling someone out of a conversation -- definitely worth it.

Plans:
The hat will stay pretty much the same. Might be able to use the barrettes for other things as well -- seem like a fun addition for partying... I'm back at kung fu classes and working on getting in even better shape, so I'm re-designing the body and legs of the costume to a more streamlined look, while hopefully still maintaining some of the flowiness. The bra will get worked into a bustier/top -- no more worries there!  I have some blue silk I think may be a good addition (dress from a Salvation Army, I think -- been a while), and kids' used shin guards that I want to make into vambraces. I'll be tackling the shoes again, but I might be removing the rhinestones and starting over, because I think I want to try to make them look kind of like boots and/or boots with shin guards.  This costume was a beautiful impression of light on water, very floaty, but next iteration will have a little more of a warrior aspect.

I wanted to have more used and/or durable materials in this costume, but didn't work out for this year. The remake will incorporate more used things, plus of course the outfit will be getting a second wear, so I'm happy about that.  Very little fabric left over, too. Some I might use in the remake, and some will get used to make fabric flowers (new thing I'm doing for sale, to use up scraps and stuff).

2) Kabuki Batgirl (Friday Night Group). Photo by L.H. Gray.

i) New Materials
-  3 wigs (the one I made and forgot at home, and the two I bought at the con to replace it), red and white makeup, setting powder, face barrier stuff (which I think burned my skin), batgirl nail decals and press-on nails, PVC join piece, spray paint, bat netsuke, heavy interfacing, black seambinding

ii) Used/Extant Materials
- Black linen (I buy it whenever I can get a sale price, as I need it for backing tapestries), grey silk (a project that didn't happen), grey linen (scrap), yellow linen (from when I used to make things for SCA), black silk hakama (made years ago for SCA reign of Kai and Genevieve), various belts and cords, girdle (made for an Anglo-Norman theoretical design), short cotton "jubon" (made years ago), Chinese flats, wool socks, black knee-high stockings, sleeping pad, Gorilla tape (used for misc. things around the house), underwear, elastic for gauntlets and shin guards, seam binding (ran out, needed a little more), shaft from snow scraper, old boffer weapon, duco cement, embroidery thread and yarn

Review:
The naginata was made mostly with used/existing materials, except for the black spray paint I used on the PVC shaft and join piece.  I chose an exterior rust-proofing enamel because we have some iron outdoor things that need some touch-ups, so I figured this would be the best option. Wouldn't work as a real weapon -- not just because the blade was foam but also because the join between the PVC shaft and the snow scraper shaft wouldn't have held up if used for a real strike -- but it survived the group shoot, which is what it needed to do.  And now the scraper shaft can go back to its original purpose :D

Left my wig that I'd made at home, didn't have enough time to put on the nails, decided against the jubon and the girdle because I didn't want to deal with them -- used an extra cord to hold things in place until I could get the obi on. Didn't have time to make the inro.

This was a great costume! Comfortable, looked good, didn't have any real wardrobe issues until late in the evening on the way back to the hotel (obi had started to come undone), and the shin and arm guards were my own design and worked really well.

The first wig I bought at the con I essentially chose because it was red and because I wanted to make sure I had something (crazy amount of people shopping) -- found a better one for Batgirl just as we were ready to be done shopping.  This first wig will go with Dark Phoenix costume for 2015, so yay.

I'm happy I had most of the materials I needed already in the house. Also, I used some of the interfacing scrap for other things like part of Shiny's hat, and will likely use it for many other things down the line. Also, it packs pretty small. I'd still like to make the inro, as it would be a shame for that bat netsuke to sit in storage.  One of the embroidery yarns that I used for the mons was from my mom's old weaving stuff, and the other was either from Barbara Geoffroy's stash or my Bergental stash. The grey kimono I made shorter so I could have the option of wearing it outside of a costume setting. Think I may need to make a belt to go with it...

Overall, I'm very happy with this one.

Purpose of Blog

As the name of the blog says, this is a dress blog.  I'll be putting all my clothing stuff here - Steampunk, Dragon Con, and maybe even "regular" clothing.

I often use new fabric (ordered/bought from a store), but I'm working on incorporating older fabrics, reclamation from other folks' stashes, re-use of existing things like curtains, tablecloths, clothing, as a way to reduce impact on the environment.  For new fabrics I try to work mostly with durable fabrics, so that what I make is not "throwaway" clothing.  Really, there is no such thing as "away" -- everything comes round full circle on our world, one way or another.

Sometimes this means doing research into techniques that are less wasteful or toxic (like papier mache instead of plastic maybe), or searching to see what I can find used. Often times it's cheaper, which is a nice personal benefit. Often it causes me to work much harder on creative solutions, so it's working my brain harder -- I need that these days, so it's all good.

For my Dragon Con costumes, every costume should have at least one item that isn't new, preferably more, because going to the convention really is a luxury, especially in today's world.