fancy dress Archives - Handmade by Carolyn

box of socks; the October edition

01/11/2019 1:16 pm \ 4 Comments \ Carolyn

I meant to post this yesterday, however I’m … ok I’m NOT going to complain about being busy. The dreaded B word. It’s annoying. Sorry!

However, ta da! I finished these socks during my holiday away in the US with Yoshimi. Here is the incriminating evidence of me in the act of conversational knitting while in San Francisco with Shams and Yoshimi… and I can assure you we’re actually sitting in our air bnb here and I’m NOT actually humiliating us all while out in public..

I took my bamboo needles away with me, because I knew airlines are ok with skinny little bamboo needles. However I did not knit one single stitch while on the plane!! Nope, upon getting on the plane I proceeded to watch movies, eat dinner, sip champagne, and sleep. I did absolutely nothing constructive whatsoever. Ha!

it’s a tough life but somebody’s gotta do it

I bought the sock yarn while I was in Japan in April… it’s Opal yarn in the Van Vincent Gogh “Vase of Sunflowers” colour way 5432; and the pattern is kinda my own, heavily adapted basic sockette pattern in a Patons pamphlet from the 60’s, no C11. I completely adore the warm swampy mossy yellowy, browny greens. So very moi.

#thePerilsofBeingaPetOwningKnittingBlogger

Before I drag out ye olde updated box of socks picture, I just want to put up this picture Tim sent through.. I’m rather thrilled he’s still wearing that outfit for Hallowe’en!!

Also I thought I’d share here my own Hallowe’en post for this year although you could not call this a costume, it’s just an outfit that I would wear on any other day. Sophie makes the whole thing, imo… that darling little powder puff.

And now… finally. Le box of socks is looking rather gorgeous, I reckon!!

Posted in: knitting \ Tagged: clementine dress, daily outfit, fancy dress, forget-me-not patterns, Knitted, knitting, Patons knitting book C11, socks, Tim

…getting a Brazilian…

04/06/2017 11:38 am \ 28 Comments \ Carolyn

Olá!

Soooo, I mentioned my brother’s BIG birthday? well to go with it he had a BIG birthday bash! with a Brazilian theme. I stupidly procrastinated about my costume, ended up going shopping for fabric the day before the party and had to cut n’ sew like a madman to get it done on time. #sewingmachineonfullblast

I’d first googled “Brazilian women” and what came up was nothing but women in bikinis. NO. Even if this were the very height of summer… still no. So then I googled Brazil women’s national costume, and oh yes, that’s more like it!

These lovely ladies are wearing the traditional dress for Bahian women, and I thought the white lace and broderie anglaise tops and headscarves and full, brightly coloured skirts so very lovely. So I set about making something like that…

For simple yet voluminous skirt that you can whip up quickly, you can’t go past a circle skirt… I bought 4m of red polyester taffeta from the $4 table at Spotlight… it is very stiff and very silk dupion like and I knew it would stick out nicely with a good amount of volume. I cut out my circle skirt and divided the remainder to make a waist sash and a scarf for part of my headgear. The skirt is a full 2m in diameter, and I thought about making it rush rush rush but nah. I just can’t do that sort of thing, even in a costume. So it’s got a proper interfaced waistband, and closes with an invisible zip and a press stud in the waistband. Hehe, while I was making my costume, Tim sent around a snapchat re it being National Doughnut Day, and I was like HA! I’m fitting right in! This is MY kind of doughnut!!

Oh, I have a little tip! I usually hand-slipstich the ends of my invisible zips to the seam allowance with a few quick stitches, but lately I’ve taken to just doing a few quick back-and-forths on the sewing machine. It’s so much quicker since you’re not having to thread a needle, and actually more stable too.

Speaking of rush rush, I admit I did not hem that giant circle skirt… it’s just overlocked along the edge there! I figure that if/when I ever decide to wear it “for realz” then I’ll go to the effort and hem it properly. Probably seems funny that I did the waistband properly when it’s not even “seen” in my costume, whereas the hem, which is fully visible, I didn’t finish properly… but you know, some things are easy to re-do later and some are not. The waistband is the kind of a thing you’ve got to do it right the first time.

The blouse is made from an old lace curtain that was originally had hanging in an upstairs window… I took it down when we re-did our floors up there and have just never hung it up again! Lazy? the view was too nice? Both really 😉 A bit off one end was sacrificed for my top, hehehe. I had also bought a length of white cotton/linen for the lining, there’s quite a few bolts of this in Spotlight at the mo’ selling for very cheap; I’ve actually bought quite a lot of it lately, for other projects yet to appear here…

My pattern is very loosely the epaulette top from She Has a Mannish style, cut to flare out more in the body and sleeves… the lining is cut straighter in the sides. The shell and lining have separate side seams, but are sewn together at the shoulders and armscye. I pinned and stitched a square neckline, cut and overlocked the edge, and then stitched a length of white cotton bobbin lace around to edge it, part of a large stash that I’ve had for many, many (many, many) years. It’s funny, I kind of threw this together just for the costume, but you know what?? I actually love it and will definitely be wearing this again, in real life!
Waist sash: 22cm x 3.8m, I wrapped it twice around my waist and finished off with a giant pouffy bow. Head scarf: 30cm x 2.4m of white, 21cm x 2.3m of the red; I’d cut the white wider to be the main colour with the red to be more of an accent, like how the Bahian ladies that had popped up in my google search have their headscarves. I’d also googled “how to tie a Brazilian head scarf” and found this video which was sooooorta helpful, I kind of based mine off her first example… but my scarf is much much longer and I obviously tied and tucked and folded extra knots in mine so as to be a much higher and more complicated affair… I’d also made two “ropes” of the white and red and twisted them to tie around my headscarf to help keep it in place.

after this photo, I redid my headscarf and I think it was a lot better the second time! but didn’t have enough time to take another pic 🙁

For footwear, I’d noticed that the ladies tend to wear low, flat, open sandals; very comfortable things like birkenstocks but not anything specific. I got out a few of my sandals, and Mum voted for my little white sandals, that I made last summer. I danced the night away in these things, and they’re still holding up great!

So that’s it! We had a blast… I wish I could show you a picture of my son Tim, who went as Gisele Bündchen in a blonde wig, bikini top, boy leg shorts and full on wings a la Victoria’s Secret. And clonking boots on his feet. It was hilarious. Absolutely he was the belle of the ball!

just use your imagination…

Another funny little moment of the evening’s preparations… Craig used this picture as his costume inspiration… we’d bought red, blue, green and yellow feather boas from Spotlight to customise the black pants and black shirt that he already had in his wardrobe.. we also bought yellow satin for a sash and a yellow velour fedora from Spotlight too…

Well, he’d cut and tied together lengths of the feather boas to make the leg and arm bands… and there was like masses of feather fluff and debris all over the floor. So he’d got out the vacuum cleaner to do a quick tidy up. Well, he was vacuuming quite perilously close to the little pile of carefully tied together feather boa bands… and I was literally just about to say “you might want to move those feather things” when FWOOOOOOOP! this quite long string of feather boas just disappeared! right up the vacuum cleaner in a flash!! Like, literally a split second and they were gone, like a garishly coloured, feathery snake zooming at top speed into a burrow, … well, Kelly and I burst out laughing and just couldn’t stop, haven’t seen anything so funny in aaaages! Panic! Don’t worry, we opened up the vacuum cleaner and rescued the ~~furry beast from its lair~~, I mean, the feather boa, fortunately none the worse for wear.

SO much fun. EEEEE, I LOVE costume parties!!

Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: fancy dress, own design, She Has a Mannish Style, skirt, top

the Zora Queen Rutela

26/03/2017 11:33 am \ 37 Comments \ Carolyn

OK, I’ve done some pretty involved and intensive projects in my time, in fact more often than not, lately! and this one definitely ticks that box too.

Quite a few months ago, Cassie mentioned that she wanted us to go to ComicCon together this year, and furthermore, she had already chosen a good costume for me to make…

source

This is Queen Rutela, the queen and elder of the Zora; proud, elegant and graceful aquatic-people who reside in the Zora’s Domain in the Zelda universe. If you’ve never heard of Zora, it’s ok, that’s perfectly normal because this stuff is the very height of geekiness and so far from the mainstream it’s a little embarrassing … However! you have now! She is a rather tragic character; the story is as follows: Queen Rutela was the wife of the late King Zora and mother to Prince Ralis. During the events of Twilight Princess, Shadow Beasts invade the Zora village, so Queen immediately sent her son to Hyrule Castle for his own safety and to inform Princess Zelda of what was going on, prompting the invaders to make an example of Queen Rutela by executing her in front of her people.

I liked the idea of going as Queen Rutela for several reasons, partly because she’s a mother so I felt she was age appropriate for me, also her story moved me because it is so sad, she’s so protective of her son and so motherly, it tugged at my heartstrings a bit. But mostly, well, let’s be honest, because her attire and bearing is just so beautiful and I relished the challenge of giving a good go to making it! Also, the Zora have always been my favourite species in the Zelda universe 🙂

ANYWAY! here we go…

Firstly, the dress. More accurately it’s a 3-piece ensemble, I made an ankle length petticoat/underdress, a skirt, and a long tunic top; all using white polyester stretch stuff (some leftovers, some new, variously from Spotlight, Fabulous Fabrics). The plain, strapless, ankle-length petticoat is one I made many years ago, so long ago I’ve completely forgotten the pattern I used. I never thought I’d say that, because I tend to remember patterns FOREVER, but not this time! The skirt has the other “skirt-y” layers on an elastic waistband, and the tunic top is a drastically modified Nettie bodysuit, basically my go-to Tshirt pattern. The sleeves are in two parts, a close-fitting “under” sleeve that is wrist length, and the “over”sleeve has a very high sleeve cap and a bell-shaped bottom edge that is gathered and “pouffed” into the under sleeve, then point-stitched in place to get artistic-y folding. At the shoulder edge, the extra fabric in the sleeve caps is pulled in with three sharp darts; making a jutty-out sort of shoulder cap… that’s a technical term there, btw.

I stitched frilly “gills” to the side underbust area.

Oh! I’m getting ahead of myself… those frills were formed in the following way; I clean-cut the eyes using my rotary cutter, then holding the edge just slightly and evenly stretched out, passed it over a candle flame; which melted the edges just a little and set them in a naturally curly frill. I took a little bit of practise to get this just right, with the right degree of frill and with minimal scorching! Fortunately, those bits that looked a bit charred black just crumbled off when I rubbed them between my fingers.

Once I’d made the three parts of the dress, I shrouded Bessie in plastic and newspaper, dressed her, masked off the bits that I wanted to remain white, and sprayed the skirt, then the top utra-carefully and judiciously with poppy red enamel spray paint (Bunnings)

The colour is a little brighter than ideal, I really really wanted a warm, dusky coral pink, but with spray paint you’re unfortunately stuck with whatever is in the VERY limited pre-mixed range… 🙁 /

Spraying was pretty scary, my application isn’t perfect, and there is a blotch on the R shoulder that is a bit heavy and which was pretty devastating for a while, but I had no choice really but to accept what I’d done. As it turned out I shouldn’t have worried too much because you couldn’t even see the blob once my headpiece was on!

Next, the fin/wings… I cut four-layers in light grey polyester organza, and simply stitched all layers together by skinny zig-zagging around all edges, and slip-stitched it in places to the top of the sleeves.

Next, the jewellery; and this bit was lots of fun! It’s a long time since I’ve played about with jewellry-making and I really enjoyed it 🙂 I used Super Sculpey modelling clay, jewellery wire and gold metallic acrylic paint (Spotlight) and some really lovely turquoise glass jewels (Fabulous Fabrics), and baked my pendants in the oven before painting them, and stringing them together. It’s hard to see the exact details of the Queen’s jewels in the short footage of her that there is, and what’s more, the details seem to vary from picture to picture, so I took a little creative license and designed my own, closely inspired by what I knew of the Zora style, and the arrangement that I could see from the footage.

The body-lace fastens at the small of my back; the necklace is supposed to sit out very wide on her shoulders, and I managed to get this look by stitching rings halfway along my shoulder, and the necklace clips onto these, wide on each shoulder. I also made a “beaten gold” collar/choker from interfaced gold metallic jersey (Spotlight), hand stitched radiating lines over it, and stitched the last pendant to it, then stitched white vinyl “petals” (Clark Rubber) around the lower edge. This closes by press studs at the back.

Headpiece: it’s simply a long tail in the same polyester stretch, stuffed with Hobby Fill (Spotlight). I inserted fins of fabric-covered cereal-box cardboard into the side seams, and I took the precaution of spray-painting the cardboard ivory first because the polyester is kinda see-through, and stitched it to the rim of a red swimming cap, also catching into the stitching a white plastic face-mask (Spotlight)

Now for the hair! This took quite a bit of nutting out…. I’d stretched the bathing cap/head-tail/face mask contraption to Mr ‘Ed, my foam head, above.

For the hair I used skinny foam noodle (Clark Rubber) and stitched the top bit of the hair through all layers. This stuff is pretty bouncy with a mind of its own, but I damn well forced that sucker to be what I wanted it to be with firm and masterful stitching to get the folded part/hair at the centre top. Take that, foam noodle!! BOW TO MY WILL…

The blonde “coral” hair was easier and actually lots of fun, like being in kindergarten again… I snipped it into lengths, and painted the bits with various mixed shades of pale yellow, shaded with addition of lilac and metallic gold. I wanted the hair to be in shades because we all know a flat colour just looks fake and, well, flat, any painted thing always looks so much more vibrant and real and rich when it has several different shades in it. Going to this much effort sounds complicated and maybe even unnecessarily involved, but I whizzed through making the hair, loving every paint stroke. I strung them on yellow thread and stitched them to the cap through all layers, and painted part of the top layer of hair in the same way. There is 35m of noodle in this thing… I can hardly believe that myself but yes, really!

One “strand” came off while I was pulling the thing onto my head, aaaaagh NOOOOOO! which was a bit of a worry, obviously! but I had plenty of “hair” and luckily every other bit stayed put.

The final step was to spray-paint the top side of the head-tail with the same poppy-red spray paint. Scary!! but I was super SUPER careful… On another note, this picture below gave me a laugh! the head looks hideous, the stuff of nightmares!!! Zoe “looks” terrified but of course she wasn’t… she’s knows what’s real and what’s not. Even on Saturday morning when I emerged from the bedroom in full costume plus makeup, all the cats just looked at me, maybe a bit quizzically! but they still knew it was me.

Oh, wait… doing the make-up was the final step, of course! I painted white dots around her brow line, just like in my inspiration pic, and then trimmed away the mask. Cassie suggested a strip of Hollywood tape on my nose, which helped keep the nose piece firmly in place throughout the day. Also, with amazing luck, Priceline had a 40% off all makeup sale in the days beforehand so I got some white translucent face-powder and rather horrible bright red rouge-y stuff for the matching poppy-red circles under my eyes and lips.

The photo at the top is my first attempt to photoshop myself into a fake background! pretty good, huh?! this actually took me aaaaaaages… hehe, #photoshopnoob Well, I felt like Queen Rutela just HAD to appear in Zora’s Domain or it would be, well, you know, just like an unfinished and half-done effort, so I decided I just had to do it!

I didn’t get any photos of me actually at ComicCon in Perth unfortunately; we were just having way too much fun! plus my gloves made it impossible for me to operate my phone! However about a million people asked to take my picture, which is not as weird as it sounds, it’s just the done thing at ComicCon when you dress up; everyone does it! Also it was highly gratifying when people recognised my character, totally made my day!!! Every now and then I would hear a call; “Queen Rutela!!!!!” which was really nice!

Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: accessories, ballgown, costumes, fancy dress, Nettie, own design, petticoat, skirt, top

something 80’s

24/07/2016 10:23 am \ 17 Comments \ Carolyn

So; like, we were going to this 80’s themed party, and, like, EVERYONE in this particular group always dresses up to the max! Not dressing the part would be heinous! and of course I had to be fully self-made, ‘cos of my challenge. Also, like, I had to be warm. It’s like the middle of flipping’ winter! Like, duh!

So … remember…. ? Flashdance…? Fame…? Yep, a baggy-rific parade of dancercise warmup gear, headbands, leg warmers *shudders* I remember it well, oh how I remember it oh too TOO well.

Fortunately, or maybe not so fortunately? I had nearly all the components, already. Dear god. My red jumper is the real 80’s deal, that I knitted for my husband, way back then, and blogged here. I purloined it from our old, knitted stash. Slipping in here…. I now never ever throw away hand-knits. I’m embarrassed to say that I have actually thrown away nearly everything I knitted in my childhood and teens, and how I regret it. Some of that stuff was actually great. Like, I’m so sure!!

I am also wearing my black Carolyn pyjama shorts, my raspberry tights, my paprika bodysuit, my neon green arm warmers – gotta have some fluoro in there, somewhere!, and my little soft, black oxford shoes, that pass for dance shoes, in a pinch. I certainly boogied and grape-vined my little 80’s-lovin’ heart out in them last night and they stood up to the challenge beautifully, thank goodness. I’m always inordinately pleased when my handmade shoes prove themselves! You little beauteeeeeehs!

I’m also wearing pseudo leg warmers and a purple headband, made from some old Tshirts languishing in my refashioning bag. For the leg warmers, I kept the old hem in place, and used this as the casing for some elastic, to hold them up on my legs. Neat, huh? No need to sew a new casing!

And of course, the Ponytail, and the Rayban Wayfarers. Oh yeah. Mandatory stuff. Oh yeah. And, naturally, I wore my sunglasses at night.

Everyone’s costumes were so much fun: there was a Warwick Capper; laugh!! and John McEnroe… actually TONNES of mullets in general… a David Lee Roth, a Lene Lovich, a Frankie goes to Hollywood dude, a Pretty Woman, a few girls dressed similarly to me, lots of Valley Girls. My husband was a pastel-perfect Miami Vice style dude. And the music was a fun-filled, boppy trip down memory lane. A totally righteous time was had!

Posted in: fashion, sewing \ Tagged: fancy dress

a passing housewife

14/05/2016 11:51 am \ 33 Comments \ Carolyn

What am I? I am a passing housewife!!!

Hehehe just to explain, Izumi Curtis is a character from my favourite Japanese anime Fullmetal Alchemist. She always introduces herself as just a passing housewife, and so is the character I can relate to the most. And so, when it comes to choosing an anime character for myself… Izumi Curtis, I choose you!!!! …that’s a pikachu reference there, in case it did not translate…

Izumi Curtis, character and artwork by Hiromu Arakawa

So, firstly… WHY?? well, in Northbridge there is a retro video-gaming bar called Respawn that my kids like to go to… and I should just slip in here that this VERY MUCH a young adult’s kind of a place to hang out on Friday and/or Saturday night. Anyway, last night was Mum’s Night, like a nod to Mother’s Day last weekend, and the deal was that if you brought your Mum you all got free entry. So naturally, Sam and Cassie hatched a plot that I would be going along with them. Of course I said yes! how often do I get invited out on the town with my adult kids? pretty rarely, that’s what! I won’t say never, since my kids are pretty fun and relaxed and not usually embarrassed by my company, but going out to a nightclub in Northbridge is not generally a family thing to do, mmmm? Fellow Perthies will attest to that 😉

Another thing about Respawn is that people often cosplay it up… and so I set about planning and making my costume… I made a sleeveless white shirt-dress/coat-dress, I wore my recently completed Morgan boyfriend jeans, and I made a pair of Japanese toilet slippers like the ones Izumi always wears.

Coat-dress/shirt-dress:

I used two patterns; Vogue 8997, a dress pattern, and for the notched collar I adapted the neckline and spliced on the collar from Closet Case patterns Carolyn pyjamas.

Alterations: for the collar, I added width to the centre back lines of both collar pieces, to fit the width neckline I was after. I also squared off the collar points somewhat, so as to match the more square collar points of Izumi’s coat dress. For the dress; I cut the bodice fronts to have a centre front opening and adapted the neckline to have the notched collar bit, and added enough extra width in the centre front to accommodate the button and buttonhole band. Likewise the front skirt piece has the buttoned opening. Likewise I cut the back skirt to have a centre back seam, and added a bit extra to the lower part of the opening to hem it.

The bodice front and back are in double fabric, and self-lined, so as to enclose the princess seams within the layers. Even though this is just a costume, I reckon there’s no need to cut corners and do a shoddy job of sewing it! I had a small moment of shock when my own Mum suggested just cutting the collar in a single layer of fabric and leave it with a raw edge … oh the horror!! I dunno, call me obsessive, but nowadays I could probably not sew a garment all rough-shod like that in all good conscience. Making all my clothes for the past few years and I am now a fair dinkum full-on, signed up member of the well-made clothing snob club, right here.

Izumi’s coat-dress/shirt-dress is very well fitted, practically skin tight across her bosom which suggests a stretchy fabric. However the collar is also quite structured and stiff-looking, more like a regular woven-fabric shirt collar. So, to get that tight, fitted look; I used two different fabrics in my bodice, a stretch and a non-stretch. Actually, I used three different fabrics all together… but more on that later…. to get the fitted tightness of the bodice AND the structured collar, I cut the bodice front and back from stiff woven ripstop cotton, and I cut the bodice side fronts and backs from stretchy bengaline. This way, there is stretch at my sides, but the shirt fronts maintain that nice crisp look of a tailored notched collar shirt. When fitting the shirt-dress/coat-dress to myself, I left the side seams until the last thing, and the final step was to pull in those bodice side seams nice and tight.

And yes, the skirt is a different, woven cotton… one that is not so stiff and has a bit more flow to it, more suitable to a skirt than the rip-stop. All are long term residents from my stash, probably from Fabulous Fabrics originally. The white buttons were harvested from a recently chucked-out doona cover.

Slippers: Izumi always wears these Japanese toilet slippers…. this is to reiterate her status as a humble housewife and that she spends her days cleaning and doing housework. I made these very quickly and simply, the padding is cut from my good old yoga mat, covered with black cotton cut from an old Tshirt. For the uppers and the underneath bit, I used some very stiff thick black cotton from Remida, from when Meggipeg kindly invited me to go with her the other day. I did the WC letters on the top by couching with some thick, white wool, leftover from Cassie’s beanie that I knitted her for Christmas.

Another pretty important component of Izumi’s look is the Flamel tattoo. Cassie drew this on with a ballpoint pen; it was a little bit hidden on me, but ’twas there…

And, you may be wondering… did I wear this outfit, and these slippers in the streets of Northbridge and in the club? well yes I did! You can rest assured that the other Mums were of course wearing all black, and heels or ankle booties and the like… but not I! I am just! a passing! HOUSEWIFE!!!!!!

pictured in the club…

Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: Carolyn, Closet Case files, dress, fancy dress, own design, shoes, Vogue 8997

Lucy Heartfilia

02/04/2016 4:21 pm \ 20 Comments \ Carolyn

Who is this?? I barely recognise my daughter in her fabulous cosplay outfit! For ComicCon this year, Cassie decided she wanted to go as Lucy Heartfilia, from Fairy Tail; the anime/manga conceived by Hiro Mashima. And she has been busy busy busy, working solidly on her costume… isn’t it gorgeous?!! I think she looks absolutely amazing!

Lucy Heartfilia from Fairy Tail; artwork and character by Hiro Mashima

And yes, Cassie’s costume is all made by herself, with just a few pattern adjustment and sewing suggestions by me.

Patterns; adapted Burda 8175 for the skirt, and adapted Burda 8548 for the vest. The corset top and the sleeves are self-drafted. Actually, the “corset” top is more like an abbreviated bodice than a corset; with princess seams and unseen skinny gold shoulder straps, that are hidden underneath her vest, and closure is at the centre back by white hook and eye tape. The sleeves are two pieced and double layered, with the white layer longer so it comes out at the bottom, and with elastic in a channel at the top so they stay up on her arms. The long gold straps on the sleeves are purely decorative. You want to see what the pattern piece for the sleeves looks like? No? well I shall show you anyway 😉

You cut two of each per sleeve, so the bottom flared bit of the sleeve is almost a full circle. A circle skirt for your arms! haha And yes, she hemmed the lot too, I think she stayed up until the wee small hours doing that job! The white and blue layers are joined together at the top with a casing for elastic, so they stay up on her arms. The gold straps were sewn on afterwards, they’re pretty much decorative. But don’t they look great!

Fabric; quilting cotton from Spotlight. Mainly chosen for the just-right colours, of course!

I’m so proud of her, because the whole costume is properly and beautifully made, and she did not take the easy way out in any part.

The dark navy blue, pleated skirt has an invisible zip closure and an interfaced facing. I suggested she make it a little longer, so she could at least wear it as a normal skirt too; but no; the costume had to be as faithfully executed as possible!

Those keys are an integral part of Lucy’s costume, and a part of her character’s story. Cassie was so thrilled when she spotted the key set in a store; and pounced… perfect for her costume!! Belt; surreptitiously extracted from her brother’s wardrobe mwahaha.

The camisole/corset top was self-drafted to fit her perfectly, and it fits like a glove! and then she drew the lines for the blue heart and gold edging on her muslin and cut it up to get the individual pieces. Meaning; they are not just appliquéd on but are all separate joined pieces; and the top is completely lined in white cotton.

She used a blouse pattern for the vest, mainly because the collar was right for the costume; it had no collar stand and was the right shape and lay in the right spot. The front and back pieces were easily modified to be a vest shape, and she individually drew out the gold edging pieces to fit, and with self-fabric facing throughout.

Really, I am so proud that she put so much care, thought and diligence into making it and finishing it all off perfectly and beautifully.

This is a character driven pose; it means “I’m watching and I’ve got your back”… and that symbol on her hand is also a key component to her character too. I freehand drew it on for her this morning, because you know; right handed, and it had to be on her right hand! It’s in pink ballpoint pen. I can’t wait to hear how her day was…. I’m sure she will be one of the best dressed at the convention!! As we drove in to drop her off, we saw stormtroopers and a Joker strolling down the esplanade on their way to the convention, laugh! It’s fantastic how everyone who goes makes a real effort to dress up in amazing costumes and really look the part… oooo I so wish I could be there to see all the costumes!!

Posted in: sewing \ Tagged: Burda 8175, Burda 8548, Cassie, fancy dress, own design, skirt, sleeve, top

Magicka robe

22/06/2014 4:36 am \ 21 Comments \ Carolyn

Have you heard of Magicka?
That’s OK, I hadn’t either until less than a week ago. Now I consider myself an expert, at least on the attire.
This weekend is Supanova weekend in Perth and Sam wanted a Magicka robe. Fortunately he had done some research and found a very helpful little pattern so you can make one for yourself. And it’s free! available here.

You might be wondering about the sausage on a stick. Please know this is an integral motif in the game, and everyone knows about that bit. Jeez.

I enjoyed making this! It is actually a pretty good pattern and you end up with a rather excellent wizard’s robe I reckon. The robe is a complete garment in itself under that hood, with an integrated chest plate piece that is joined inside the right front and snaps closed at the left shoulder seam: the hood does cover up the chest but the chest plate piece is a nice detail in that it does completely remove any slight risk that your undershirt might show.

The hood is separate, and rather mega-bucks cool, non?! I actually kinda love it. When I saw the pattern piece I was like no way, but it sewed up to be perfectly draped and mysterious and magic-y looking.
It was designed and the instructions written by someone who does know what they are talking about, like the hood and sleeves are fully lined. For some reason the sleeves are called “arms” in this pattern. The instructions are aimed at the beginner. I’m basing that assumption on directions like “Hint! Fold the fabric in two, so you can cut two of each piece in one go!”
At the same time, my view is that some of the steps are not explained in full enough detail for a complete beginner, for example the instructions for inserting the contrasting edging strip in the hood opening would be a little confusing for a beginner, and some of the illustrations are in the wrong spot to go with the accompanying sewing directions. Also, when drawing up your pattern pieces a few measurements are missing. No biggie, you can still work it out, it’s not rocket science. But just saying.
At first I thought it might be designed for a small person, like a kid, as a Halloween costume or something; and it might not fit my six foot two son. So did a few quick measurements, and yes indeedy this is a wizarding robe designed to fit a full sized, and tall, adult man. O-kaayy!
I used panne velvet, navy blue polyacetate for the hood and sleeve lining and gold satin for the edging, all fabrics from Spotlight.

Actually, the panne velvet was in absolutely shocking condition, the absolute worst I have ever seen for a brand new fabric.
After rolling out the first 2.5m we saw the fabric was sliced completely off from selvedge to selvedge, and had been joined together again with multiple little plastic joiner ties. Yep I’m talking full price, untouched on the roll, straight from the factory, fabric here. We’re not talking about a remnant. I knew I could easily cut the big skirt pieces from that first bit so I told the girl I would still take that as part of my whole …. “are you sure?” she asked, clearly horrified, but I assured her it would be ok. She continued rolling out and next thing we came across huge holes in the fabric. Holes. Like big holes, easily 2 inches across and boom! right in the middle. The first one she said, oh, I’ll just give you that bit, but by the next one, she was looking doubtful again, and I was starting to think twice too. After the third hole popped up she just offered to give me the entire roll, for the price of 6m; the quantity I had asked for. So far I’ve only just seen those three holes, spaced about a metre apart from each other.
I’m not dissing Spotlight here, after all they can’t check all their rolls of fabric and the staff at Spotlight are always very good about giving you extra and/or discounts when there are imperfections in the fabrics. But damn! that fabric was in a bad way!
And I now have masses of ultramarine blue panne velvet. Yay. I have zero idea what I’m going to do with it. Sheets? haha.

Posted in: Uncategorized \ Tagged: costumes, fancy dress, pattern review, Sam

the paper doll project

22/07/2013 8:35 am \ 12 Comments \ Carolyn

(I’ve pledged to wear only clothes handmade by me this year and to sketch my daily outfits in my Fashionary. I’m calling this the paper doll project)

4th-9th July
from left:
mustard dress, f-leather jacket, black tights, hand-knit socks
mossy green top, ivory curtaining skirt, paprika tights, cream hand-knitted scarf, hand-knit socks
strawberry jeans, white Tshirt, lt grey hoodie, hand-knit socks
leopard print Tshirt, little grey skirt, spiral leggings, hand-knit socks, army jacket
army jacket, grey thermal, black Tshirt, navy corduroy skirt, beige scrumpled leggings, hand-knit socks
white Tshirt, black corduroy jeans, peppercorn cardigan, hand-knit socks

10th-15th July
from left:
panelled corduroy dress, black wool tights, grey wool coat
leopard print top, Pattern Magic gathered hole dress, paprika tights, hand-knit socks, army jacket
black Tshirt, chocolate cardigan, sludgy little skirt, swirly leggings, hand-knit socks
emerald corduroy skirt, grey top, grey wool coat, black wool tights
white shirt, little lt grey skirt, peppercorn cardigan, beige scrumply leggings, hand-knit socks
sew bossy dress, chocolate cardigan, denim-look tights

16th-20th July
from left:
raincoat!, navy corduroy skirt, white Tshirt, red hoodie, paprika tights, hand-knit socks
crochet Granny squares skirt, army jacket, black wool Tshirt, black wool tights, hand-knit socks
grey LS thermal, grey/black Tshirt, purple jeans, army jacket, hand-knit socks
emerald corduroy skirt, calico cardigan, green PM top, grey/black striped Tshirt, hand-knit socks
petrol corduroy skirt, paprika tights, red hoodie, raspberry scarf, black Tshirt, hand-knit socks
Servalan dress, grey wool coat

Brrr! it has been so cold lately!! and I have gleefully re-discovered my army jacket and been wearing it a whole bunch of times… O how I love that thing! It’s fabulous how I can slip it on over a little Tshirt or short-sleeved dress and it instantly renders any little summery thing winter-appropriate. Big love for thick winter parkas. And it has even been cold enough to get out that Granny squares skirt again, saving it from white elephant-dom 😉
We went to our sci fi do on Saturday night, and Servalan got out and about again and had intergalactic geeky fun… her first outing was to Supanova with future grrrl a few weeks ago. This time Servalan let her hair down and boogied like a boss. You know a party is running hot when the smoke detectors go off and the fire engine shows up! Chewbacca hanging off of a fire truck is not a sight you see every day.

A few asked about Craig’s outfit… well I was all set and quite keen to make him something and then he decided to go as Neo. Well do you know how much it costs to make a full-length leather coat, even a fake leather coat. No? well twice as much as to hire it, that’s how much, and yup! I checked out the offerings and did the sums to find that out, and was just like, oh man, really?!?

Neo; source

Plus it’s important to be able to admit when a sewing project is going to be masochistically difficult and have a very small fun factor, yes?
So he hired one. And looked tres cool…