My Sewing/Cosplay Projects

[Halasían]

Wow! Great Talent! Thanks for sharing your art and passion with us!

 

[HALETH✒🗡]

These cosplay projects are the most beautiful ones I've ever seen, @Maedhros_Nelyafinwë ! Your talent is truly admirable.

 

[LaurelinBearsFruit]

Agreed with all the above compliments @Maedhros_Nelyafinwë! The fact that you dyed and embroidered everything yourself alone puts your stuff far above the rest. My wife and I (really her more than me) have dabbled in making costumes for the Ren Faire by us, but nothing even close to that level!

Really well done. Can't wait to see what you come up with next!

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

Thank you so much for your kind words, everyone, it means a lot to me!

I mentioned this briefly in the writing topic a while back, but sadly, I realized there was no way for me to finish Star Princess in time for the comic con. I basically had two and a half weeks left and I had just barely started the bodice beading, and in addition to that I would have also needed to add the bodice ruffles, and make the tiara and mask. But, I figured I'd share how the cosplay currently looked before I stopped working on it (and focused instead on adding some extra embroidery to Picnic Padme).

First of all here's the bodice after I gradient dyed it. This is THE most difficult dye job I have ever done in my life. The reason why it's difficult is because the blue dye gets everywhere and if even one tiny drop of it gets on the pink areas, that's it, it's a mess. It's also hard to get the colors to fade together gently and not have any harsh dye lines. This is a three way gradient between pink, purple and blue. It's actually sort of a 4 way gradient because I had to spend so much time blending the blue and purple that there's sort of an indigo area there as well. Most people who make this costume are saner than I am and spray paint it instead of dyeing it, because dyeing it like this is so difficult and messy. But I didn't want a crunchy fabric paint texture on it, and I'm skilled at dyeing anyway, so I gave it a shot and I'm glad I did! The fabric is silk habotai, which is very easy to dye.

In the above picture, you can see the beginnings of the beading. I had wanted to at least dye the bodice and start the beading, and see how fast the beading would go, to see if there was any chance of finishing it before August 2nd... but, nope. The beading sure is fun to do! I'm looking forward to devoting proper time to it after the con is over.

I'm also immensely proud of the skirt. Unlike the Rooftop dress which has a hoop to support it, the Star Princess skirt is completely supported with tulle. I bought 30 yards of tulle for this project and used almost all of it!! The skirt is 3 main layers that go on separately, starting with an innermost blue layer:

On top of that goes what I call the Floof Layer or the Cupcake Layer:

This layer is primarily responsible for giving the skirt its bell shape. The ruffles are sewn on upside down so they naturally stick up, and fight gravity, so when the heavy top layer pushes down on them it creates a full, fluffy bell shape. Quite a lot of engineering and physics goes into this deceptively simple skirt!

Lastly, there's the top layer, whose primary purpose is to do the color gradient from white to pink. There are 4 or 5 skirt layers inside it with white and pink sections of varying lengths, so that when the final layer of star tulle is laid on top, the eye naturally blends the colors together to create the illusion of a gentle gradient:

All together, the skirt looks like this (and I'm very pleased that the back is fuller than the front and has sort of a bustle shape; this is more historically accurate to the 1870s):

And the inside view of the skirt looks really epic too! I love how the camera creates a purplish looking layer even though there is no purple fabric. It's just light reflection between the pink and the blue.

Lastly, here's a reference showing what the costume is supposed to look like after it's done.

And here's a close up of the beading (you can see there's no way I could have possibly done all that in two weeks...)

So yeah, I was really bummed to not have this finished for the upcoming comic con. But I'm hoping to go to one early next year and hopefully it will be done by then!

 

[Tyelkormo the Fair]

The colors blend so perfectly together it's so gorgeous 😍
Yours is going to look even better than the original!

 

[CheriptheRipper]

Quite a lot of engineering and physics goes into this deceptively simple skirt!

You can say that again, on a real I didn't understand like half of what you just said but the color mash on the first pic is beyond impressive 😍
Real shame you couldn't manage to get it done in time 😭

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Amazing work, as always! 🤩

(I could make a Silmaril necklace for her to wear, but the part of me that loves the Fëanorians wouldn't be happy about that...)

But it would be a must, for your lucky "Beren" to place around your neck! I dreamed once of doing that at a Worldcon, with my own Luthien, but alas, it was not to be.

BTW, which Comicon are we talking about-- a regional one? The big one (San Diego) is happening now, and if you want my opinion, your magnificent work needs to appear on the largest stage in the world! 🙂

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

Yours is going to look even better than the original!

Oh, my version will definitely not beat the version made by the professionals in the Broadway costume department, but thank you!

But it would be a must, for your lucky "Beren" to place around your neck! I dreamed once of doing that at a Worldcon, with my own Luthien, but alas, it was not to be.

Yeah, there's no Beren in my life... not a lot of people out there that I like!

BTW, which Comicon are we talking about-- a regional one? The big one (San Diego) is happening now, and if you want my opinion, your magnificent work needs to appear on the largest stage in the world! 🙂

It's the Boston Comic Con. I have some friends going to it, so that should be fun! Yeah, I really wish I could make it to SDCC but I hear tickets are impossible to get! Apparently they sell tickets first to previous attendees, and then people go and buy way more tickets than they need and sell them for obscene prices on the internet. Maybe next year I can try to get tickets, and if I did I would love to enter the cosplay competition and see how I do. If not, C2E2 in Chicago also has a pretty well-respected cosplay competition, so maybe I'll try to do that as well. I don't enter cosplay contests a lot because they take up the whole day and it's less fun than goofing around at the con with your cosplay buddies. The one at Star Wars Celebration 2019 was the only one I ever joined.

 

[Tyelkormo the Fair]

Yeah, there's no Beren in my life... not a lot of people out there that I like!

Not in mine either,and I can't go around wandering,the only thing I'd get is hit by a car or bus

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

You guys are

But that's okay-- special people deserve to be. 🙂

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

And you know why we're picky? Because we read Tolkien! I already had high standards but deep diving into the Tolkien fandom made it so much worse lol!

I'd much rather be single than in a relationship I don't like anyway.

 

[Tyelkormo the Fair]

And you know why we're picky? Because we read Tolkien! I already had high standards but deep diving into the Tolkien fandom made it so much worse lol!

I'd much rather be single than in a relationship I don't like anyway.

Can't find anyone to be the Faramir to my Eowyn

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Well, you're both young, so lots of time still. 👍

people go and buy way more tickets than they need and sell them for obscene prices on the internet

All I can say is "ugh".

 

[Olorgando]

Costume sewing is probably my biggest hobby.

Erm ... I can reattach a button that's come off ... 😬
But I have an amusing anecdote about that.
In the German school in Bombay that I attended 1962-66, everyone, including the boys, were taught "needlework". It was a really small school.
Then probably in 1965, when my parents and I were in Germany, my parents being at a health spa to recover from the effects of living in the tropics, I was in a children's vacation home, at 9 years of age.
Well, a button came off my shirt, and as some kind of "educational" measure (I think I might have occasionally been annoying at that age 😬 ) they told me "well, you can just sew that back on yourself, young man!"
I just love the memory of the dumbfounded faces when I reappeared a few minutes later with the button sewn back on. 🤣

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

Erm ... I can reattach a button that's come off ... 😬
But I have an amusing anecdote about that.
In the German school in Bombay that I attended 1962-66, everyone, including the boys, were taught "needlework". It was a really small school.
Then probably in 1965, when my parents and I were in Germany, my parents being at a health spa to recover from the effects of living in the tropics, I was in a children's vacation home, at 9 years of age.
Well, a button came off my shirt, and as some kind of "educational" measure (I think I might have occasionally been annoying at that age 😬 ) they told me "well, you can just sew that back on yourself, young man!"
I just love the memory of the dumbfounded faces when I reappeared a few minutes later with the button sewn back on. 🤣

Haha, nice! I definitely think more people (including and especially men) should be taught basic hand sewing so you can fix a button or mend a hole or stuff like that.

 

[Tyelkormo the Fair]

Haha, nice! I definitely think more people (including and especially men) should be taught basic hand sewing so you can fix a button or mend a hole or stuff like that.

Who's gonna mend the holes on my hands then?

 

[Olorgando]

Haha, nice! I definitely think more people (including and especially men) should be taught basic hand sewing so you can fix a button or mend a hole or stuff like that.

Or mend an old winter coat to put on when going out on the balcony in cold weather. I'd gotten this one in 1987, and by the time my wife and I moved into the apartment we still live in in 2008 was definitely showing wear and tear, especially the latter. I kept sowing up the tears that appeared, but it made the coat look like any of the Frankenstein's Monsters of film fame from Boris Karloff onwards. I get rid of it a few years ago when the leather got too brittle to be usefully sewn anymore.

 

[d4rk3lf]

Oh wow..
I haven't read the whole thread, but I am amazed how well this is done.
My personal favorite is the very first picture on this thread - with Star Wars theme
(even I don't personally like Star Wars that much, and I think as a concept and raw story is overrated).
But still.. look at that picture... such an amazing costume, pose, background, colors, composition.. etc.. amazing job.

Common girl... sew some cloth, give it to your boyfriend, or friend, record him when he looks at the sea, so we all finally witness the moment before Tuor met Ulmo.
Of course, the above is just a suggestion, I think I can't even imagine how much work and effort comes into each of this piece.

I intentionally didn't say "how much love you put into all of this work", because, it's obvious, and the work itself screaming of it.

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

Here are a few pictures from the comic con this weekend! I'm not actually posting a lot here because the vast majority of my pictures are with other people, and I don't want to post pictures with friends and strangers who aren't on this website. So here's a few by myself:

These are from Friday, the first day of the con. In this first one here, a local steampunk group had this booth with a steampunk Victorian parlor thing set up, and I enjoyed posing here with the tea set:

Also from Friday- whenever I cosplay Christine at a con, I love going up to the Ghostbusters people and asking them if they deal with opera ghosts! I always tell them I have a rather creepy one haunting the opera house where I work and he's appeared to me in my dressing room. But I do get free voice lessons out of it...

Sadly, this is the only Padme picture I have by myself from Saturday.

I spent much of Saturday hanging out with this guy who has a really good Anakin cosplay, and we took all sorts of Anidala pictures and videos. We also walked the Cosplay Red Carpet together as Anakin and Padme. (Before you ask, he has a girlfriend, and she's very chill about him doing romantic photoshoots with Padme cosplayers.) Lots of people were cosplaying as Anakin and Padme that day because Hayden Christensen was there as a guest. (I met Hayden back in 2019. I was supposed to see him in a panel on Saturday night, but it got canceled, probably because of the Screen Actor's Guild strike going on.) But anyway, I was (unfortunately) one of 4 people cosplaying as Padme in her picnic dress. I never like wearing a cosplay that lots of other people wear! But, a few other Picnic Padmes and I recreated that Spiderman meme where the three of them are pointing at each other, so that was funny!

These next pictures are from Sunday, the last day. I think this was the most fun day of the con for me because I got to hang out with some friends that I met at Star Wars Celebration 2019 and hadn't seen since. They were cosplaying as the Broadway versions of some Disney princesses, so with me cosplaying Christine, we coordinated! We did an informal photoshoot of sorts out on the lawn outside the convention center.

Behold the glorious back of the Rooftop dress! Unlike the Broadway costumes, my version has the historically accurate 18th century detail called a sacque back, which is those pleats at the back that sort of become a cape or a train. The Broadway costumes don't have a sacque back because the costume needs to be put on in a quick change, and it has a zipper in the back. But zippers weren't invented till the 1930s, so I generally don't use them in my historical costumes. And I don't actually have to quick change into this dress, so I figured I would go ahead and put the historically accurate sacque back in!

Also, I believe this is the con where I finally mastered Christine's hair. (Side note: in this picture I'm wearing the stays. Stays are like the precursor to corsets, worn in the 18th century and earlier. My stays are fully boned with over 100 zip ties, which is a great substitute for whalebone. The stays are super important for helping the bodice lay flat and smooth, and for holding up the weight of that heavy gown.)

For reference, this is how her hair is supposed to look:

It's very important to have those face-framing forehead curls; it's what sets her hairstyle apart and makes it look Victorian and not like some generic vaguely-historical princess. With a little help from some fake hair pieces in addition to the shorter face-framing layers I have, I think I pulled it off! Also, it helps that my hair has gotten very long; I haven't even gotten it trimmed since July 2022. So now it's waist length even when in tight ringlet curls, and closer to hip length when wavy or straight! Some people thought my entire Christine hairstyle was a wig, but I'm very proud to say it's my natural hair! (Except for the little forehead framing curl pieces.) Christine actresses on Broadway always wear a wig for practical reasons. But now that my hair is so long, I'm not sure I could stand to wear a wig anymore, which is one reason why I didn't bring Elsa along to this con. And for Padme and Christine, I take pride in using my natural hair to recreate their hairstyles.

Lastly, there's always some Tolkien stuff at these cons, but not usually much that I'm interested in, given that I'm more of a Silmarillion fan than a LotR fan and I'm not usually too interested in the LotR merch. But there was this chocolate shop at the con selling fandom chocolates, and I just had to get the Tolkien ones!

There were no cosplays of Tolkien characters that I was aware of, sadly. I actually don't see them nearly as often as I see Star Wars, Marvel, and animes I've never heard of. I do think that if I were to cosplay a Tolkien character, I'd either like to do Luthien or Varda. No one would know who I am, but hey, hardly anyone knows who I am as Rooftop Christine either.

If any of you are interested in seeing the pictures I have with other cosplayers, which are way more fun, a few of them are on my Instagram already and there will be more coming soon. I could link my Instagram here if that's okay, or I can give it out via PM upon request. (Mods, what say you?) It's a public account, so anyone here is welcome to look at it.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Amazing work! 🤩 You should be very proud of it!

Sure, Instagram links are fine, as long as there's no inappropriate content-- which I'm fairly confident yours doesn't have. 😄