1920s continued

So remember that 20s dress I made the other day for a hen do? Well I had a spare 30 mins. So I made a matching handbag!!

Need to reposition the Velcro on the flap, not happy with how it sits. Tbh I'm not all that happy using Velcro, but that's all I had lying around the flat. I tend not to have a stock pile of magnetic snaps.

Otherwise I'm pleased with the look, I decided to use contrasting side panels to give it a more modern twist. What do you think?

Vintage coat

If you remember I posted a while back about making this coat for winter:

For reference, that's Butterick  B5824 - Patterns by Gertie. Yesterday I went fabric shopping with Carrie from Sewing Pretty and we spotted this lovely fabric, in a black/pink design and a matching lining fabric in dusty pink.

I also treated myself to a few new sewing things, some carbon paper and pin wheel, and a tailors ham! The Mr. did look very confused last night when he found it in the kitchen (where I keep the ironing board) and even more so when I told him what it was called! He is quite good and just smiling and nodding at sewing terminology - though I think he will always still giggle when I talk about boning (actually that's a lie - we both giggle at that!!)

First step today is to cut the pattern, and start to cut up the muslin. I know I'll need to modify the pattern to fit, the joys of being 5'10", so I'm doing things the proper way and making a fitting muslin first to save the proper fabric.

Gertie did a sew-along with this pattern, with videos and photos, so fingers crossed this should go well!

Oh and if you haven't ever read Gertie's blog you're missing out! I've been a fan for about 5 years and have half of her patterns (as two more were released last week!) and her book, so please go and check her out!

Minamicon Cosplays

Back in March I attended MinamiCon and not surprisingly, cosplayed! This time as Regina The Evil Queen, from ABCs Once Upon a Time, and Seven of Nine from Star Trek Voyager.

First, Seven of Nine

For the full shoot, please visit my lovely photographer Pouncy's flicker set.

Next up - Regina. Again not going to go through the full step by step of making this costume, but I will leave you with 7500 beads, or 13meters of beading!!!

Borderlands 2 - Mad Moxxi Warning! Photo heavy post!!

Last weekend, some friends and I went to Ayacon and as an event that includes cosplay, we naturally obliged!

Myself and my friends Carrie and Liam decided to make costumes from 2kGames' Borderlands 2, Myself as Mad Moxxi, Carrie as Tiny Tina, and Liam and Mordecai

We entered the masquerade, and Carrie won a prize!!!! (Walked straight out of a video game award) We had some amazing shoots with these costumes that weekend, and I've added a few of my favs below.

Moxxi was a relatively simple costume to make, velvet base, with fabric paint stripes. The buttons had to be hand painted, as did the swirls on the black and white collar&cuffs.

Speaking of which, those had to be hand crafted to look right, so the pieces were cut from white fabric, traced onto paper, cut up to give the exact right shapes and colours, re-cut in the back and white fabrics and stitched back together again (then painted!) Sounds complicated, but really only took an afternoon to do the whole thing.

Right now onto the photos! All credits go to:

• Andrew Reid http://www.flickr.com/photos/redkun/
• Luke Caines https://www.facebook.com/PharaohShoots
• Jonathan Cullinane http://www.manylemons.co.uk/)

1920s dress

I have a friend's hen do in a couple of weeks and the theme is 1920s flapper. Well as any curvy girl knows the traditional flapper girl isn't the most boob friendly design.

So I did what any maker does, any just made my own. I looked around at images of 20s dresses that didn't include fringing and came up with my own design.

I nipped into town yesterday and picked up some fabric, not sure what it is, there was just one roll in this color, but as far as I can tell it's a cotton/viscose blend, but in a gorgeous pink/coral shade. I also picked up some wide flat lace trim, and a few meters of embroidered and sequinned trim for decoration.

 

It was a simple draft, pretty much a tube dress with slight bust darts, I know darts aren't particularly authentic, but when you have bigger boobs.... then it was just a simple angular cut for the neck line and arm holes.

The arm holes and hem are overlocked, the arms then top stitched down. The neck line is faced. The trim and lace were just  sewn on top, the bottom trim encapsulating the bottom hem, and just peeking off to bottom edge to give the dress a softer bottom line. 

Costume modification

Back in October I made Disney's designer Aurora for an awesome full group of princesses. In two weeks time I'm running race for life with a friend and we decided to do it add Disney princesses (again! 2011 we dressed as Cinderella - ball gown and Ariel - pink dress), this year as Aurora - pink dress and Ariel - mermaid.

I decided the easiest thing to do would just be to modify the designer version, while it's not 100% accurate and also not perfect (well the update did only take about an hour and a half...) I'm still pretty pleased.

I will do a proper post about the original dress soon I promise!

New patterns for work

Recently I've been looking to make some clothes for work. Being 5'10 makes it difficult to find nice work clothes that for properly. For example a dress I wore the other day is meant to have a natural waist line, I wore it pretty much as an empire.

So I order two new patterns, the first is a collection of vintagey styles, fairly reminiscent of the 40s can't decide which one to make first! I'll decide probably after I've been fabric shopping. (Though I do need some pattern paper to extend these properly.

The second is a nice twist on the simple bodycon, with diagonal tucks on the front and back.

This one I'll be making from my lovely raspberry knit jersey that I have a massive stash of

Long time no see!

OK wow, I haven't updated this blog in so very long!

If I'm honest I just didn't really have the drive to do it, and didn't feel like there was much to say. but looking back over the things that I've created since my last entry, then, well I'll be the first to admit I'm wrong! Additionally I've been busy getting married and having an awesome honeymoon in New Zealand with the Mr, so have been pre-occupied!!

SO what have I made since 15th Nov 2010?

• A tonne of costumes (as some of you may recall I'm what's known as a cosplayer - I make replica costumes from existing sources, e.g. Anime, sci-fi, comics etc).
•  Princess Aurora - Disney's Sleeping Beauty
• Cinderella (ripped dress) - Disney's Cinderella
• The Beautiful Enchantress - Disney's Beauty and the Beast
• Effie Trinket - The Hunger Games film
• Seven of Nine - Star Trek Voyager 
• The Evil Queen (Regina) - ABC's Once Upon A Time
• Twisted Fate - League of Legends (a very quick costume for my brother) 
• Dresses
• My 3 bridesmaid dresses
• A kimono sleeved slinky dress
• A 50s style halter neck, with a full circle skirt
• A simple black dress with 3/4 sleeves and an A-line skirt (for work)
• Skirts
• A cherry print half circle skirt with side seam pockets
• A fully lined pencil skirt (for work)

And to be honest probably loads of other things that I just can't remember right now! I will try and start back-filling the blog with photo's and some how-to's on some of the things that I have made. At the very least some 'lessons learnt' from a couple of projects!

Looking to the future projects, I have recently bought three patterns from Gertie's collection . For those that don't know Gertie, she is a (mainly vintage) sewing blogger I have been following for years, and last year released a book and 4 additional patterns. I highly recommend following her! www.blogforbettersewing.com

First up, I'll be making this lovely little number from some fab muted raspberry jersey-type fabric I pick up a while ago.

Butterick 5882

Then this gorgeous number for some good friend's wedding in September. I have yet to buy fabric - I just can't decide!

 Butterick 5814

Then I'll move onto something completely new for me - A coat! Again I don't know what fabric yet, I'll see what the shops start to stock in wool blends, but I'm currently thinking a light pattern, possibly in the blue or green shades.

Butterick 5824

So yeah that's the jist of the last two and a half years. Next post will be on my most recent dress, the slinky kimono!