2013 In Review

In 2013 I finished:

My 1872 Bustle Day Dress for Arisia:

Maghda from Diablo III for Arisia:

 

Vanellope for Arisia:

Lady of Lanterns for Costume Con:

 Samwise Gamgee for Thing 2 for Costume Con:

Lil' Pyro for Thing 2 for Costume Con:

Aang the Last Airbender for Costume Con:

My curtain dress for Costume College:

 

Otilia for WorldCon:

 

Ayumi Hamsaki's Ladies Night for WorldCon: 

Twilight Sparkle Princess Dress for Thing 1 for Halloween:

 A dinosaur for Sir Ally Saur for Halloween:

Daniel Deronda Seaside Gown for PhilCon:

Monday Progress Update: January 28th

When last I left you, I was furiously finishing up for Arisia.  Here's what I've got on that front:

 I painted all the candy I sculpted for the wig out of sculpey.  Then I styled my wig and glued it on.

So Vanellope turned out like this:

 

And OMG is it a comfy costume!  I'm gonna love wearing this to other cons.  I do need less ganked tights, though.

More work was done on Maghda:

I took off the sculpted bug face from my armor and cast it with clear cast.  I needed faces for my bugs.  They got painted gold.

I also needed to pattern all the pieces off my headpiece, so I once again masking-taped it up.

And then cut all the pieces out of iron-on fabric, rounding the corners and making them slightly smaller as I went.

 The pieces ironed on.  The gold-painted beads were hot-glued on at this point, one in the center of each square.

Bug making then happened.  I started the bottom with this torn-apart christmas ornament.  I covered it in Worbla and then twisted the end to make a stinger.

The body was made by forming Worbla over this candle.  I then added on the stinger end and a rolled edge to better hold the face on.

 Wings were made on a jig, which was made by pounding nails into a board in the shape of the wing.  Wire was then wrapped around the nails.

I wrapped the wire in cellophane and heat-shrinked it to the wing shape.

I then cut slits in the bugs and added the wings on, holding them in place with more wonderflex and worbla.

And I added legs.

Yay Bugs!  I then sewed a few of the inner legs to my neck corset and the outside legs to an elastic band that went around my arm to hold them on.


This is how it all turned out:

My favorite onstage pose.

And, even though my armor fell apart onstage, which made me do this:

 I still won a workmanship award: tie for best workmanship Master Class.  Ah, well, there's always next time to do the presentation without anything falling off :(

I also finished my bustle dress.  No in-progress pics, but some pretty ones Jennifer took in the hall:

My wig needs to be de-crooked, but otherwise I'm pretty happy with it.  I feel pretty!  It might need more bows, though :P  And more buttons if I can get my hands on more.  The hand-done buttonholes are pretty, and a lot easier and faster than I though they'd be.

I didn't get to wear my Ladies Night outfit, and I didn't get a pic of the Song 4 U dress, so those are still to come :D

Monday Progress Update: January 14th

Feel like I didn't get anything done this week compared to the last few weeks.  Probably because what I did get done was handwork and mockups, and more handwork and mockups.

Bustle Dress:

My 1870's Day Dress is getting completed finally.  I looked at the underskirt for a while and decided I wanted emphasis on the gathering, so I hand-tacked a 3/8" velvet ribbon onto every tuck seam.  Then I added a ruffle at the bottom and hand-sewed a pleated satin ribbon with a 3/8" velvet ribbon in the middle onto the ruffle seam.  I also added a ruffle to my overskirt, and more pleated trim:

Then I proceeded with the bodice.  I made a mockup and tested the fitting.  Refit the waist and shoulder, did another mockup.  10 mockups later my sleeves were still icky and I was frustrated.  Thankfully my husband came home from a business trip on mockup 11.  He started taking pictures of my mockups, which really helped me see that the problem was in my armscye and sleeve cap:

Mockup 11:

 Pattern adjustment to the center back:

Mockup 12:

Mockup 13:

Mockup 14:

 So, 14 mockups later I had a good pattern to do my final bodice out of.  I made it out of silk faille flatlined with polished cotton (did you know washing polished cotton turns it into muslin?  I did not :( ).  I also used the pleated trim very liberally on the finished bodice, so much that it totally covers up the painful piping I did on the bodice neckline:

Ah, well, it's pretty.  Now it needs bows.  BOWS EVERYWHERE!!!


I also got a little work done on my Vanellope costume:

I dyed the hoodie numerous times to get the right shade of teal.  I think it is still a little light but good enough for now.  I also added the pink "sewn" look to it:

Finally, I started the skirt.  After a talk with Bethany over how to do the pleating I am thinking I can get it just like the picture and not fake it with knife pleats or something.  Here's the cut out skirt fabric:

And here's the start of pleats:

Wish me luck, I've got to finish up both of these costumes and the remaining details on Maghda by Thursday!  Also next week's Monday Progress Update will probably happen on Tuesday due to Arisia this weekend.  You've been warned :P