Tag Archives: Nettie

brown

16/02/2022 8:52 pm \ 8 Comments \

Yes, it is still extremely hot here.  And I am dying a little bit in these photos.  But what can I say?  I found all of these coordinating fabrics in my stash -mostly leftovers! – and each one was the perfect size to cut out the individual pieces for the skirt.  Win!  And I also had the acorn brown merino, that I’d bought last year during a sale from the Fabric Store.  So I feel like this is a totally seasonally inappropriate outfit that was nevertheless just crying out to be 🙂

The skirt pattern is the new FibreMood Crystal skirt… with some alterations, of course!  Let me explain… the pattern is very simple really; the front and back are the same except mirror images, and the waistband is straight.  Very uncomplicated.  I’ve made several skirts like this in the past and they’ve usually been fine.  However, nowadays I have higher expectations of my skirts, and I really really want for all my skirts to have pockets.  I know pockets can sometimes be a bit of a hot-button topic.. I’ve been seeing sewing peeps on instagram lately saying that they usually leave off pockets?! and that they hate them?!  amazing! but well to each their own.  This is why we make our own clothes, yes? not someone else’s.  I personally, love to have pockets, so I set about plotting how I could add them to the skirt.

I cut my waistband at my regular size, but cut the skirt pieces a size bigger than I would normally go for to allow for hands in pockets. I also cut and put in slanted pockets, and added darts to the skirt front and back to bring in that extra width to the waistband.  Instead of a zip, I made the skirt closure to be part of the pockets, as per this side-opening-over-a-pocket tutorial that I published previously here.  It’s quite a good method for adding pockets to a skirt actually  🙂

Added bonus is that my skirt fits really well now too, thanks to the darts!

I bound the edges of the pockets with some other brown cotton from my stash, which appears mysteriously to be grey in these pictures, but honestly it’s a deep black/brown.  I used the same brown cotton to bind the hemline.

My top is, of course, my usual modified Closet Core patterns Nettie.  This time I used my twin needle to finish the sleeves and hem, instead of bands.  I used thread from stash also rather than go shopping just for new thread, and the close-ups show how it doesn’t really match very perfectly… but honestly, the difference doesn’t show up quite that much!  Actually, all the close-ups here make the different browns look shockingly different, far more so than they are in real life!

Of course I added some of my new date-stamp labels.  Love these!

 

the caramel corduroy at the top of the skirt was leftover from these jeans, and the two middle cotton canvases were leftover from my Blanca flight dress and my Issey Miyake trousers… the dark brown, lightweight cotton corduroy that I used for the frill at the bottom was not a leftover, but one that Cassie had bought for me from Tessuti during a trip she took to Melbourne one year.  And, as mentioned, I bought this acorn merino last year.

Taking into account that I do have some leftovers still; these two pieces used up about 3m of fabric from my stash…  meaning this outfit brings me up to 13m for the year!  17m to go!

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some wide-legged chocolate trousers

03/11/2021 3:19 pm \ 12 Comments \

I guess the title says it all really!

Well, a little more detail wouldn’t hurt I suppose  😉  This is the latest and 10th thing in my #use12 mini capsule wardrobe that I proposed for myself at the beginning of the year.

I used Vogue 1693, an old Issey Miyake pattern that I’ve had for many many years, and am very sorry it’s not available any more since it’s completely unique and I think a real beauty too.  I’ve made the trousers once before too, a navy blue pair.  Although a few commenters, particularly my husband, ahem, did not think they were as wonderful as I did (!) I really liked them and ended up wearing them a lot!  I personally thought they were all of chic, “interesting”, comfortable and flattering, a combination that doesn’t pop up all that often.  Maybe they’re a little “80’s” but I am an 80’s child at heart still, no point in denying that.  Also, all things fashionable do come around again at some point and I’m a believer that if you like something then it’s perfectly ok for you to wear it.  ps, he did come around to them in the end!

For these ones I bought the same fabric from Spotlight that I’d used for my first pair since it worked out so well… a medium weight cotton twill, this time in a rich tobacco-chocolate colour.  I actually bought the fabric about two years ago but did nothing further, probably since I was still wearing the navy blue pair quite a lot at the time and didn’t feel that desperate need for a new pair yet.  And now the Time has Come!

 

The chocolate dress zip was already in my stash, it was a trifle too long but that’s not really a bother if you’re truly committed to using up the stash like I am right now! and the buttons are recycled off of an old pair of jeans that I made about ten years ago, these ones here actually.  Yes, I finally bid those adieu just recently too… it takes me a long time to say goodbye to things sometimes!  Also, thank you so much to lockdown me who devoted an entire afternoon to sorting through and neatly stringing together all of my unholy button stash into batches.  T’was worth it!

Oh, I also made the little white T-shirt I’m wearing too… it’s a modified Closet Core patterns Nettie, as usual.  I have often joked to myself that the last thing I need is another white top… but I was recently forced to throw out my previous small, short-sleeved white T-shirt because it really was disgracefully shabby from over-wearing… and I’ve really missed it!  White cotton jersey was thrown my way by Mum just recently; actually quite a massive length of it, like enough to keep me and the whole family in white T-shirts for the rest of our lives, I think.  Thank you Mum!

Video? why yes! … currently up on my youtube channel here:

I’ve probably said this before? but anyway, I am truly grateful to everyone who does watch my videos and leave a like and maybe even a comment or something.

I’m so excited that my little #use12 capsule wardrobe is nearly finished, and EXTREMELY excited to really get into it and style them all together for a little photoshoot when it is completely finished!   I can’t wait to see how/if they go together as a complete set as well as I’ve been hoping!

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3 merino netties

30/06/2021 10:43 pm \ 1 Comment \

To be perfectly honest I don’t know why I keep calling this a Nettie because I’ve rejigged it so much it literally has zero of the original seam lines left…

… anyway!  above is my new sweater/ tee in the Fabric Store merino knit, colour Vanilla; I made it using (sort of) the Closet Core Nettie pattern and added a short wide turtle-neck collar… I love this tee so much! even though honestly I don’t really need to make another white or even white-is top as long as I live.  I don’t care I still love it!

Worn with my Closet Core patterns Pietra shorts in BamBam cotton drill from Spotlight, and ye olde self-drafted tights

二 … another new sweater/tee; same pattern, same fabric in colour Marsala.  Worn with my outback wife V 1247 skirt, self-drafted tights

三 … below; same pattern, this time with a bound neckline, and the same fabric in colour Forest.  Worn with this little wool tartan skirt, fabric bought in Tokyo during a holiday there… boy that feels like decades ago now!  I wish I could go back some day!

below, closer to actual colour

So; I had bought all of these beautiful thin merino stretch knits from the Fabric Store online during one of their sales… I had this idea once upon a time of making a tee in every colour in their range but just to do it bit by bit, buy maybe two new colours per year.  I don’t know now if I’d still do a tee in every colour…   since we moved and I had to finally own up to the fact that my stash is GINORMUOUSLY HUGE,  so I’m kind of on a mission to use up my stash before buying anything else at all.  And now with the completion of these three new tees, I’ve successfully used up nearly all the merino in my stash, which is kind of amazing! Yes, I said “nearly’ I still have about another sweater’s worth of the ivory leftover, and small leftover amounts of marsala and mustard left too, oh and also the forest, but the forest is thankfully already cut out and well on its way to be completely, and gainfully, used up which is totally awesome news.

oops, almost forgot! the last, forest, (sort of) nettie is the next in my use-12 fabrics challenge that I set up for myself at the beginning of the year… yes, I got a bit behind with this for a few months but I hadn’t forgotten it!

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some noice new basics…

31/08/2020 1:37 pm \ 3 Comments \

I’ve had this post sitting just as a draft for weeks now and just keep adding new tees to it but I’m rapidly coming annoyed with myself that when I wear one of them I have to write “not blogged yet” in my ootd blog.  So I’m hitting “post on this thing right now.  I know I know, so ridiculous!

A long-term goal of mine is to have a full complement of colour range in my winter tees; so every time The Fabric Store has an online sale on their merino I tend to hop on and pick up a coupla new colours.  Then that luscious new fabric just sits there in my stash for a few years.  Occasionally I admire the pretty colours and dream about how wonderful it’s going to be when it’s done.  Of course winter is nearly over, so it seems like the perfect time for me to finally get going!  Actually, it’s not such a silly plan of attack really, because it’s right about now that I become so heartily sick of my winter wardrobe that I don’t want to wear any of it, so it’s been rather nice to have a few new things to inspire me!

First up, above: a gorgeous strawberry-milkshake pink – technically Rose pink –  new Pattern Magic twist top, from the first Pattern Magic book by Tomoko Nakamichi.. I’ve made this design up several times before and have loved each and every one.  I love this one too, though I kinda wish I’d made the straight-grain sleeve just a leetle bit wider because while it’s fine while I’m wearing it it’s hard to squeeze my hand through the sleeve and pop it out the other end!  I had actually anticipated this and made it a few cm wider, but it’s still a wee bit snug.  Wearing it here with a skirt made using Vogue 1247, and a scrap of denim given to me by a friend cleaning out her stash… details here

Secondly, a  new heavily modified Nettie tee, with a collar variation that I’ve used before, and love.  Yes, it might look boring but I absolutely know this is going to get worn to death!  This is in the Vanilla colour way. which I think is my perfect white.  I made this one with the sleeve and lower hems finished with a self-band, as per this method..  worn here with my newest skirt, my sunshine-yellow Paprika Patterns Jade skirt, details here

Thirdly, another heavily modified Nettie using this stunning burnt orange merino, actually colour Paprika from the Fabric Store…Worn here with my Sabrina mini-skirt, made with a beautiful herringbone wool tweed, inherited from my grandmother’s stash, details here

Fourthly; yet another modified Nettie, made with this Avocado merino from the Fabric Store; with a slightly wider and higher collar… to be honestly I’m not totally sold on the collar, it’s maybe a scant 1cm too high and I haven’t ruled out cutting it off and shaving off that little bit!  mostly just for appearance sake, I may even be glad of the height when the weather is cold again.  We shall see, we shall see…  worn above with my blue Sasha trousers, also a Closet Core pattern, and blogged here.

Anyway, I really like how fresh my little collection of new basics is looking right now!

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outback wife

01/10/2018 7:23 pm \ 70 Comments \

My dear sister-in-law S gave to me a length of precious “Outback Wife” barkcloth for my birthday… soooo thrilling to finally get a piece of this gorgeousness for myself!  I’ve bought other designs of this once or twice before as gifts for others but never for myself for some strange reason, I know not why … Because, oh my gosh this stuff is just so lovely, sews up like an absolute DREAM!!  I’m in love!  I’m seriously thinking about sneaking out to Calico and Ivy and buying more!  For meeeee!

I turned to my ol’ reliable, tried and true,Vogue 1247 for the skirt… my copy of this is now a little bit tattered, not surprisingly since this latest is version number 23, ahem.  I just counted, and wow, that’s a shock, even to me!  Yes, I really do need to move onto a new pattern…  A lot of my V1247’s have been straight, sans pockets, because to be honest, although the pockets in this design are really cool I actually don’t really use them all that much.  Very occasionally for my phone and keys and it’s very rare I shove my actual hands in them..  I worry about distorting the lines of the skirt and contributing to premature pocket sag.  And if there’s one thing NO ONE needs in their life, it’s premature pocket sag, am I right?   Quelle horreur!

But for old times’ sake, I put the pockets in this version.

I über-carefully cut my pieces so the print matches up practically everywhere, along both horizontal skirt seams, and as well the centre back seam, and even the waistband seams matches as well as it is able.  This took only a little bit of frowning and sighing, and moving my pattern pieces around more times than the most diligent of sleight-of-hand operatives, but it’s always a worthwhile thing to do, I reckon.  Otherwise, the not-matching pattern would probably bother me forever.

At the same time as I was making my skirt, I happened to notice in my stash two lengths of very thin jersey knit that I’d bought at the Fabric Store in Melbourne during one of my trips over there with Mum and Cassie, one a bottle green and the other in deep teal blue; both an absolute perfect match for the skirt!  It was meant to be!!  I quickly whipped up (k-tchaaaaah!) two long sleeved modified Nettie tees.  These are practically identical to each other, narrow neckline bands and wide sleeve and bottom bands.

It’s so funny to me, looking at these pictures.  See, S actually gave this fabric to me back in early June, yes, it was a very early birthday present!  and I made the skirt and two tees up straight away, like within a week.  And took the pictures of the tees on Bessie, though it was too cold to actually wear them at the time… then a few months later, early September to be exact, I took the wearing-with-black tights-and-boots pictures.  And did precisely nothing with those pictures, either.  As it happens, I’ve been in a bit of a funk over the past few months, feeling a little intimidated, like I’m just not capable or good enough, almost on the point of giving it up entirely.  Generally speaking, it’s been taking me a looooong time to write a blog post lately, like almost as long as to make a little dress for myself.   And so I’ve just been feeling… less inclined, and oh so lazy about it, to be honest; even though I want to write.

Anyway; yesterday, it was a perfectly beautiful day and we went out walking at the beach, and I wore the whole lot of them, the skirt and both the tops too.  Meaning, in my funny weird little world, a blog post must transpire.   Eeeek!  Quick sticks!!  so I gave myself a bit of a pep talk.  Just lay it out there.  With minimal fiddling.  Just spill, organically.   I mean apart from spelling.  I am as it happens, the biggest spelling nazi imaginable.  I roll my eyes on the regular, at the newspaper, at advertisements on instagram; at all the offending “your”s instead of “you’re”s and so on.  I’m sooo judgemental, the absolute worst, in fact!  But, I’m getting off track…  where was I?  Ah yes, writing without pause.  Letting the words flow, flying from my fingertips, of their own volition.  That’s what this is.  Stream of consciousness blogging, for better or worse.  Well, that’s what blogging is supposed to be, right?   It’s supposed to be a personal journey?  Just me, being me?  SO!  I hereby free myself of further worrying, right now.  Begone, thy treacherous feelings of inadequacy!!  Vamoose!  Whooooosh!!! And; this house, is clean *… I hope!

* … name that movie 🙂

  

Details:

both tees; loosely based on Closet Case patterns Nettie, thin cotton jersey
Skirt; Vogue 1247, in Outback Wife barkcloth
Tights; made by me, details here
Boots; Roberto del Carlo, from Zomp boutique

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coupla delicious merino tees…

13/06/2018 3:41 pm \ 26 Comments \

So, every now and then I tell myself that I’m not going to make any more winter tees since I have quite a nice little collection, really.  And I think I really should be making do with less; wearing what I have, more.  I tell this to myself quite firmly.  But then also every now and then the fashion-loving side of me is dreaming up some outfit and identifies a few colour gaps, and thinks, if only I had a mustard tee? or a nice navy blue…?  And that fashion-loving side can be a terribly convincing wench, especially when I’m standing in the Fabric Store in Melbourne, with Mum and Cassie, fingering the diviiiiiiine merino collection for which the Fabric Store is justifiably famous.  On our last trip over, suitably enabled, I bought a few pieces.  There may be a few other colours that came home with me and are still lurking in Le stash, too…

If I’m allowed to toot my own horn for a bit, I really feel like I’m nailing the tee-construction front at last, which is nice.  I have my tried and true pattern, and my technique is pretty solid now.  My tried and true pattern? well, my paper pattern was originally the Nettie, but I’ve sliced off here and added on there; and generally butchered it so much that literally nothing of the original remains.  Interestingly, I originally used to use a Burda pattern for my tried and true Tshirt pattern, and heavily modified that too.  Then I mislaid the Burda, and started using the Nettie instead.  Then, at one point I found my old Burda pattern again, yay!!  So, of course I had to overlay them, just to see.  And hilariously found I’d modified these two, completely different patterns to be basically the same, final pattern, in the end.  Hahaha.

 blue tee has a wider neckline and lower scoop than the gold one

I’m just laying my construction out here in the interests of documenting my “sewing journey” – ha! – just because this, my current go-to method for making a plain tee nowadays, is one which has been working pretty well for me.

Seams: first I stitch a seam using a medium-long straight stitch, and stretching the fabric slightly as I go.  This is partly a basting step, really.  Then I go over it with my overlocker, which is both the “finishing bit” and also a reinforcement of the first stitching.

Order of construction; shoulder seams first, and once they’re overlocked I go over and top-stitch the seam allowances down to the back, about 5mm from the join.  Then I put in the sleeve caps (no topstitching) and press the seam allowances towards the sleeve.  Then stitch the side seams in total, from the bottom hemline right along to the wrist edge of the sleeves.  Next step is to measure the neckline… sometimes I cut a low scoop neck, sometimes I leave it a bit higher, depends on my mood at the moment … and cut a strip for the neckline, 95% of the length of the neckline, plus 2cm for the joining seam; width; I generally like about 4cm, resulting in about a 1cm finished width.  Stitch it in a loop and insert it, as per this tute.  I then go and back edge only! top-stitch the seam allowance of the strip down to back edge of the tee about 2mm, or quite close to the join, to stabilise and strengthen this area and help prevent it from stretching out.

The sleeve edges and hemline edges; variously, I like to either add a strip, of whatever width takes my fancy at the time, or to fold the edge under in a traditional hem and stitch it using a twin needle.    I’ll either overlock the edge and simply top-stitch it with the twin-needle, leaving the overlocking showing inside; or do the double fold and baste first before twin-needling if I can be bothered, which is not so often.  In the case of my mustard tee, this time I actually could be bothered.  If doing the strip method; it can be cut EITHER to 95% the length of the edge for a “pulled-in”, sorta sporty look, or the same length as the edge for a smoother, more sophisticated look (I think)  For my gold-y mustard tee, I did a strip edging (same length) for the sleeves, and the twin needle finish for the hemline; while the navy blue tee has a strip edging (again, same length) for both the sleeves and the hemline.

It’s probably hard to tell, but I used the navy blue fabric inside out, because it was a little more intense in colour and duller on the wrong side, which I preferred.  The right side of this merino knit is a touch lighter and shinier.  For this reason I kinda wish I’d used the wrong side out for the mustard tee, too.  Oh well, next time!

I’m wearing the mustard tee/charcoal outfit today, in fact, right now, because basically I finished it and HAD to wear it straight away!  THIS COLOUR IS TOO TOO BEAUTIFUL, OUI????  The navy blue tee/red skirt/tartan scarf outfit above was put together just for experimental styling purposes, and to model it for this post; but I adore that one too so I think I’ll be wearing that tomorrow  🙂

     

Details:

Tees; kinda Closet Case pattern Nettie, kinda my own design; fine merino knit
Skirts; both the Paprika patterns Jade skirt, details of red one above here, charcoal one below here
Tartan scarf, above; made by me, details here
Coat, below; McCalls 5525, charcoal wool, details here
Tights; my own design, black polyester stretch, details here and my tute for making your own custom fit tights pattern is here
Boots; Roberto del Carlo, from Zomp shoes

also, on a completely different, not-even-sewing related, random note; I was outside by the clothesline with Bessie, taking pictures of her wearing my new tees, and noticed these teeny. tiny, weeny little mushrooms growing in the seat of the jarrah chair I keep by the clothesline, to put my laundry basket on.  How cute is that??  I guess we have been getting a lot of rain lately!!

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I made some stuff…

31/01/2018 1:27 pm \ 25 Comments \

So, what are the latest whatevers to wing their way out of the atelier, hmmm?  Well, I’ve been making LOADS of things, just nothing much to show for it, as yet.  Remember I mentioned I was making a pattern?  Well, making a pattern comes with making a truckload of muslins, of course.  I’ve actually made 13 dresses in the last month alone, albeit they’re made from old sheets and are a bit rough, but still.  Am I going to count these in my “one refashion a month” resolution? no, that wouldn’t be fair.  How’s the pattern coming along? swimmingly! which is fab… I’m almost at the testing phase, I will be incredibly happy to get there after 8 months of preparation.  8 MONTHS!

In more tangible making results, I made a little romper for Sarah’s new little boy…  Sarah LOVES stripes, so the descent into stripe-matching madness struck once again.  I used Butterick 6372, which I’ve made twice previously, and just altered it slightly to be a romper, and added that cute little pocket.  Would you believe I re-did that little pocket THREE flipping times??  First I made a curved bottom pocket, which was pretty awful, followed by a flat bottomed pocket.  Equally awful.  I do really like the pointed bottom pocket though, I think it’s super cute.  It’s my favourite part about the whole romper actually!

The striped cotton terry is from Spotlight, hopefully the last piece of fabric I will buy this year, given Project Stash Reduction is a goal this year.  The red cuffs and pockets were culled from a Wildcats Tshirt from my refashioning pile.  Thus partially fulfilling my once-a-month refashioning resolution #virtouslyRubbingFingernailsOnChest.

There was a little bit of leftover striped fabric, so I also made an adult sized beanie, using a pattern made by Andrea of fabric epiphanies.  I’m afraid though that I couldn’t for the life of me work out how to print it up so the sizing square was the correct scale… three attempts later, and eventually I settled for “pretty close”.  I estimated my beanie is actually about 7-8% bigger than the pattern, and then Sarah informed me it is too small! aaaagh!  It is a pretty cute pattern though, I will still probably give it another go one day  🙂

The stripes do match up all around though, both inside and out, a matter of personal pride for me.  I bound the beanie using a strip of blue merino, given to me by Mum.

So, after cutting the romper cuffs and pocket from the Tshirt, I still had quite a chunk of Tshirt leftover, well this wouldn’t do!  I immediately realised, as you do; that I could get two pairs of knickers and a bra from the leftovers.  Well, I’m sure that is the first thought anyone would think, hmmm?

I used the cloth habit Watson pattern, and cut out a bra plus two sets of matching knickers… yes, it was an XL Tshirt. I avoided as much of the advertising as possible and tried to stick to just the Wildcats logos as much as I could.

As I was making it, it occurred to me… is jungle January still a thing?  See, in the past few years I’ve been in the habit of making a set of underwear for jungle January, and one of the things about the basketball is that the Perth Arena is known as “the Jungle” during the Wildcats games.  Like, they’re always screaming  “WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE!!!!!!” and going on about “…. HERE IN THE JUNGLE…!!!!”   “Jungle” I guess because, wildcats.  Anyway, it occurred to me that I was serendipitously making a jungle-themed set of underwear again.  Without even meaning to!  Win!!!

Do you wanna hear something funny?

I’ve been in the throes of making this set for several weeks now, fitting it in as light relief in between working on my pattern, you know; and I took it along to the sewing guild meeting yesterday in the hopes of finishing it up.  And there I had the joy of seeing Emma also making a Watson bra.  Except her’s was really beautiful; super pretty, with chartreuse lace, pink and blue elastics, generally all round gorgeous and very feminine.  Just absolutely lovely in every way.  Such a contrast to my sorta … lowbrow one made from an old basketball Tshirt,  With logos, and everything.  Like something a teenager might wear.  Or more like, refuse to.  Omigawd, so embarrassing. I swear I don’t try to be like this.  It just happens.  Every now and again, I think back to an anonymous commenter who used to frequent my blog, and who couldn’t resist from pointing out my 1) immaturity and 2) unnecessary penny-pinching-ness, among other things.  Ahem, guilty as charged!

Fully lined with a lightweight stretchy stuff that I discovered during my stash clean out…  My tutorial for fully lining this pattern to enclose the seams, is here

 

I thought about not posting this next one… but wellll, here goes… I’ve also made another thing, squeezed out from the Wildcats Tshirt, I mentioned it was an XL yeah?! I also got a little cropped top, much nothing to write home about at all… I made it specifically for my new workout aspirations.  I hadn’t made any working out or losing weight resolutions on New Year’s Eve … but just lately I’ve been feeling a bit stodgy and decidedly… “matronly”, is the only word I can think of.  So I decided to do something about it, and purchased the Kayla Itsines Bikini BodyGuide.  One thing you’re supposed to do before even getting started is take a picture of yourself, preferably in a sports crop top and little shorts, and then take a new picture in the same ensemble every week as you work through the guide.  So obviously I had to make myself a little crop top, asap!  I used my customised version of the Closet Case Nettie bodysuit pattern and whipped up this super basic thing, just edged with a line of white overlocking thread around all the edges, which I think looks nice with my little white shorts.  I made those too.. they’re are the eponymous Carolyn pyjama shorts.  I rolled them up a bit, to show as much abdomen as I dared.  Hopefully, it’s going to become a more shapely one in a few weeks!  Don’t worry, I will not be posting a new picture here every week, but I’ll probably do an summary when I finished the course!

I started out with the beginner’s schedule, and practically killed myself just doing day 1!!

before… 

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the Zora Queen Rutela

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

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

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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!

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