Fake-torial for a Fake Corset

I call this a fake-torial because I'm not sure that anyone would want to follow these directions to make my cobbled-together-leather-pieces-masquerading-as-a-corset. But hey, even then, it's good to keep track of one's thought processes, right? One day I will make a real corset and look back at this and laugh.

My "pattern" pieces: not to scale.

Directions to make my Bellatrix costume underbust fake corset: 
(fake because its only corset-like aspect is lacing and grommets; click on any of the pictures to see a larger version)

1. Get a pair of leather pants, or some other source of leather from the thrift store (skirts, large men's jackets, tote bags, etc.) I recommend thrifting your leather to reduce the number of animals killed for their hides, to promote less waste/reusing/recycling/reducing the number of tanning chemical released into the environment, and simply because it's cheaper than buying new. Alternately, you could use synthetic pleather, but I don't know what working with it is like. The pants I used were a lovely buttery soft texture which made it a pleasure to work with (aside from the grandma smell).

2. Decide how tall you want your corset to be and draw a vertical line on a large piece of wrapping paper ($1/roll at Target!). Figure out your underbust, waist, and hip measurement and draw them so that the vertical line bisects each line. Sketch curved lines to connect the lines, making a shape that roughly approximates your body shape. See my diagram below.

3. Cut out your paper pattern and use it to cut out four pieces of leather: front right, front left, back right, back left. Sew a bunch of zig-zag stitch lines all over the pieces to approximate Bellatrix's patched-together look.

4. Fold over the straight side of your back pattern pieces and stitch in order to make a thicker section for attaching the grommets. Wonder why the leather isn't feeding through the sewing machine properly, then realize it's because it's slightly sticky. Sandwich with tissue paper, then run it through again to great success.

5. Tear off the tissue paper. Pick off the little bits that are still stuck to the seams.

6. Sew the side-seams for your pattern pieces. Hold up the pieces to your body, only to realize that for some reason the front pieces don't meet properly. Realize that it's because you forgot to put in seam allowances. Draw and cut out a trapezoidal piece (see above "pattern" piece) to fill in the gap. Remove the napping cat, who has taken advantage of your temporary absence from the sewing desk chair.

"But I'm too cute to disturb!"

7. Sew the trapezoidal piece in between the front pieces.

All the pieces together.

Close-up of the trapezoidal piece.

View of the inside.

8. Put grommets into the back pieces, about 1 inch apart. Curse the thickness of the leather that defies your hole puncher's best efforts. Realize that it's not the hole puncher's fault, as it was meant for paper. Cut 3 yards of ribbon and lace up the back following this helpful tutorial.

Trying to take pictures of black things and still capturing the detail is ridiculous.

8. Squeeze into the corset and have your husband tighten the laces and tie them into a bow. Done!

9. After you come back from the HPDH2 midnight showing, realize that you should harvest the rest of the leather from the pants, resulting in this:

Hmm...what can I make with all the leftover leather scraps?

Disclaimer: I don't really know what I'm doing when it comes to making real corsets. I am aware that a real corset should have boning, probably a lining, and a busk in front. This is just my make-it-up-as-you-go process that works well enough for costuming purposes. Most of what I do falls under this category, in fact. That said, I loved the process of trying to imagine what I wanted to make, trying to translate 3D shapes into a 2D pattern, trouble-shooting, and coming up with a decent product. I think that's my favorite part of sewing, actually.

The End of an Era and Leather Pants Grandma

Bellatrix and Tonks, all friendly-like.

Last night, my husband and I and another couple went to the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 midnight showing. Being that it was the last HP film, we went all out and got dressed up. The movie was well done, but it made me so sad that there are no more coming. There are only a few movie series that I truly love, and while Star Wars came out before I was born and is therefore a moot point (Episodes I-III don't count), at least with the Lord of the Rings there are two more Hobbit movies coming. So it was with simultaneous heaviness and elation that I donned my Bellatrix Lestrange costume to go see Harry finally fulfull his destiny.

I'd forgotten how much fun it is to get all dressed up -- the last time I did was for a Dungeons and Dragons encounter and that didn't really count. As we walked around and marveled at other cosplayers (can you really call them that if it's just a movie showing?), we did get a couple requests for pictures, which is always kinda awesome. I have to say, I think I was the most movie-accurate Bella there that night...a lot of people had sort of generic gothy-witchy costumes. However, even then, I was still missing a lot of elements, like the silver swirlies all over, and I opted not to wear boots (too warm -- why have a movie premiere in summer when the major characters all wear layers and layers of black robes?!).

I began by drawing the Dark Mark on my inner left forearm in black eyeliner pencil. I was afraid it would be super tricky, but it turned out okay. I sprayed a black frizzy wig from Party City to get the white streak in Bella's hair, and of course I had the bird skull necklace I made last week.

For Bellatrix's top, I cut apart a black long-sleeve tee at the shoulders and up the sleeves, hemmed the edges, and then inserted many, many grommets and threaded black ribbon through it all. The skirt was this beautiful, wispy, flowy long chiffon skirt that I thrifted for $8. I absolutely loved how it would flap around my legs as I swept from place to place. After putting on the top and skirt, I tied the wand holster around my waist on a piece of ribbon. I thought about attaching to the corset, but decided that I might want to use it in the future without a wand...

This was actually extremely useful during the premiere, since wands are kind of long and pointy and get in the way of everything.

Not too bad, for being cobbled together without a pattern.

The corset was nearly a disaster. I didn't have quite enough ribbon for the lacing, so after I'd laced it all up, I couldn't quite shimmy into it because there was barely any slack! My husband had to tug it down over my head while I awkwardly wiggled and tried to breathe through the leather. All this to say, I got plenty of the grandma smell for several minutes. As I said before, since these leather pants were thrifted, they smelled strongly, and I mean STRONGLY, of grandma. You know, that indefinable old-people-sickly-sweet-musty-potpourri-plus-mothballs-and-who-knows-what-else smell. Gotta love it. At first, I was annoyed about it since Bellatrix, the best lieutenant of the Dark Lord, should not go around smelling like a cookie-baking, sweater-knitting little old lady in a rocking chair. But then I thought about it more and realized that if any grandma was going to even OWN leather pants, it would be someone who used to be like Bella. You know, a grandma with A Past, who used to do cool things like ride motorcycles (I don't know what else would require leather pants). Just no sadism, insanity, and maniacal laughter, of course. So I guess it is appropriate after all!

The icing on the proverbial costume cake was a snake ring I randomly found at Claire's. I colored in the clear rhinestones with a a green Sharpie, and tada! (chroma morphius?) A Slytherin ring!

All in all, I loved my Bellatrix costume...this is the first time I got so detailed in making sure I got all the elements as close as possible, as well as the first time I made something so complicated! Now that I've made my second fake corset, I think I could almost tackle a real one.

The microwave and wok in the back kinda take away from the whole feel of my cursing stance. Perhaps I am in this kitchen taking down unsuspecting Muggles.

Pretending to be Ollivander

Last night, in preparation for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2, my friend Jennilyn and I spent nearly four hours making wands for our characters. My husband just sat on the couch, preparing his D&D encounter, incredulous. Let's just sum it up by saying that Ollivander's job is much harder than I imagined it would be!

We started out with some plastic pipets that my husband brought home from work. He's a research scientist, and these pipets are pennies each, so this was his way of supporting us in our fandom. By painting, taping, and hot gluing, we were able to take these clear tools of biology labs and slowly (very very slowly) turn them into the tools of witches and wizards (albeit without the dragon heartstrings or unicorn tail hairs inside).

Walnut got curious about what was going on.

Things got a little crazy as we got more into it.

Finally, after all the paint and glue dried, we were able to Sharpie in our design details. This morning I also added some dark glaze to the wands so that they would look more dark wizard-esque. Here are the final results!

Top: Nymphadora Tonks; Bottom: Cedric Diggory. Jennilyn did an excellent job with some challenging wand shaping.

Top: the Elder Wand! The nodules, which are meant to be clusters of elderberries, are made of hot glue. I did consider making Voldie's original wand, but the crazy shape at the end defies masking tape. Bottom: Bellatrix' first wand, which she loses to Hermione.

I think the dark glaze really makes a big difference.

I also finished my corset yesterday, which I'll hopefully show tomorrow. It was definitely a trial-and-error experience, trying to draft one from scratch! Now I just need to figure out how to get the white streak in my wig, then make a Voldemort robe for my husband, who so graciously agreed to accompany me as the Dark Lord.

Bellatrix Costume Progress and Another Anthro Knock-Off

It's actually a lot less shiny in real life.

In the last two days, I have finished the top and the necklace for my Bellatrix costume. The top was tedious only because I had so many grommets to put in (25!)...I finally decided that the sleeves were just going to have the laces sewn in instead of putting in another twenty-some-odd grommets. The necklace was surprisingly fast: half an hour of sculpting this morning with silver Sculpey (and it only took 1/8th of the package!), then baking and cooling for an hour, coloring in the eye sockets and nostrils with black Sharpie, and quickly twisting up a wire hook to hang it on. Total hands-on time: 45 minutes! It doesn't look exactly like the actual necklace, though, probably because I started sculpting and then was too lazy to wash my hands and pull up a picture to reference. The skull needs to be a lot wider, and of course mine isn't as hollow and delicate as the real one. However, rather than making another one and have two bird-skull pendants lying around, I think I'll just call it good enough :/

Now I just need to make the corset and a wand, and possibly purchase a wig. The only problem with the leather pants is that they smell overwhelmingly of grandma. I don't know what grandma was wearing these leather pants, but I definitely experience some cognitive dissonance when I look at and smell the pants. Somehow, a grandma-smelling Bellatrix just seems wrong to me, so I'm going to need to find a way to deodorize them.

***

Besides the scary smelly pants, I also picked up a skirt at the thrift store yesterday that was perfect for an Anthropologie knock-off I had in mind. I've always loved the full, flowy floral skirts that Anthro does so well, like the Apothecary Skirt, the Full-On Floral Skirt, and the Settee Roses Skirt.

I'm calling this the Calliope Skirt, because that's the brand on the tag! When I saw it on the rack, I was immediately drawn to the fabric. The pattern of flowers and various fruits was just right combo of vintage-y but not kitschy. Originally, the skirt was pretty long -- ankle length definitely makes me look granny-ish! -- but the waist fit nicely, so all I had to do was cut and re-hem. I love an easy refashion! Other things to love about it: 1) it has pockets! huge pockets! Pockets are so useful on skirts! 2) the sweetheart waistline! 3) it was only $1.50!

All in all, it's been a super-productive morning. And I still have all afternoon to work on my Sew Weekly challenge!

Incidentally, the top I'm wearing was a self-drafted disaster. I was trying to go for merely flowy sleeves, but instead I got this fabric-ruffle-overload thing that makes me look like I'm wearing some kind of weird football gear. However, I needed a white top to wear while photographing the skirt, and I have to say, both are deliciously twirly...

Here I am imitating the Looney Tunes Tasmanian Devil.

Weird Hobbies

Elaine and I after the Tucson Zombie Walk.

I think most little girls enjoy dressing up, but apparently I haven't grown out of it like a normal person would. I am partly enabled by my best friend Elaine, who seems to like doing the same things. When The Return of the King movie came out, my best friend Elaine and I went to the midnight showing all dressed up. Everyone thought we were crazy; she dressed up as Frodo, and I dressed up as Minas Morgul. My very talented sister painted a balloon to look like Sauron's flaming eye, which I then suspended on a horned headpiece. Unfortunately, I don't have pictures since that was pre-Facebook, and apparently our photo-hosting site from that even went defunct many years ago. More recently, we've also dressed up for a Renaissance Faire and a couple zombie walks. This is apparently strange (at least in my circle of friends and acquaintances), since I'm always greeted by "You did what?!"

Now that July is upon us, my next big project is getting ready for the Harry Potter Deathly Hallows 2 midnight screening. It's the last installment of the HP movie series (octology?), and when this is over, there is nothing else in Potter-verse to look forward to...sadness! I remember when I first read the Sorceror's Stone so many years ago (in secret, because my dad wouldn't let us read it because it had magic and witchcraft), and how beautifully JK Rowling developed the story over the next several years. When the last book came out, I was so sad because it meant there was nothing else coming. Well, that wasn't entirely true, since there were still the movies, but now that this is the last movie there really is nothing else!!

Too much gray, even for me.

I thought cosplaying for ROTK was a once in a lifetime, silly college fangirl thing, but it looks like I've found other people crazy enough to dress up with me for the HPDH2 midnight show! Well, one other girlfriend. My husband, despite my pleading, doesn't seem too keen on the idea.

While Hermione is my favorite character in the books (bossy know-it-all bookworm? that's me!), I decided I wanted to do something a little more offbeat than just finding a gray jumper and a school uniform skirt. I mean, I worked at private schools for six years; school uniforms are not exciting. So...I am dressing up as the ultimate crazy person, Bellatrix Lestrange.

This was my first self-drafted nightmare bodice.

Having made at least part of all my previous costumes, it only stands to reason that I do what I can for my Bellatrix outfit. I thought about going all out and getting velvet and silver paint, but let's be reasonable here: I'm not bringing in any bacon currently and my husband is going to be a grad student shortly. The theme of the story is good-enough-to-get-point-across. So I'm refashioning an old black long-sleeved shirt for the bodice. I already have a fantastic thrifted black skirt that I originally bought just because it was too beautiful to pass up...I'm so glad I did! I'm still hoping to thrift a black leather skirt to cut up for the waist corset thingy, and thinking about getting a wig since my hair's not that long yet, but we'll see. I'll be making my own wand, and if I have time I might even attempt the bird skull necklace!

 

I would really, really, really love it if my husband dressed up as Lord Voldemort (we could be the best couple that never was!), but for some reason going as a bald pale nose-less dude doesn't appeal to him. Gee, I wonder why.