My friend says I'm crazy

Just thought I ought to catch you up on what I'm doing.

I'm knee-deep in costume sewing for WorldCon / Mid-America Con II. Now, I've never been to a Worldcon before. and given the steep price, I hadn't planned on going to this one even though it is in my home town of Kansas City for the first time since the 1970s. But......
Then I saw who the artist guest of honor was.

Kinuko Craft!! My favorite children's book illustrator!

Okay, I guess that means I'll go if I can get one of my books autographed. So I signed up for the installment plan and had a year to look forward to it.

Of course I started thinking about costumes.

Of course I should do a costume from one of her books. Hmmmm... which one?

I know! Cinderella! The most outrageous, over-the-top dress of all time!

But I have a year to do it in, right?  (rolls eyes)
So I started collecting fabric, since I knew this was going to be an expensive project.

 I found the perfect orange/gold iridescent organza on ebay for a very good price. And some lace from fabric.com.




Add some gold satin, light gold glitter tulle and a boat-load of lace trim and I was in business!


More in the next post...

Costume-Con recap (or Holy Crap! How late is this post?!)

So I actually competed in the historical competition at Costume Con. No workmanship awards, because I am fully aware that my workmanship on this one was crap. Seriously. Major crap.

I was more interested in getting it working than how it looked inside.

First of all, I have to say that I am bad at thinking up clever presentations. Very, very bad. So I was determined to win a performance award this time. I tried to think of something that I have never seen done at a costume convention. Aha! A quick-change!

Not the kind where you flip your cloak inside out or something. Those have been done. I mean the kind that magicians do where you can't figure out how they changed outfits completely in 2 seconds.

I wasn't sure if I could do it, but I started researching. I decided on the Edwardian era, because I figured that I could stuff a lot of fabric inside one of those pigeon-front dresses. ;-)

So here is what I came on stage in:



















Then I stepped behind a screen for 5 seconds and emerged wearing this:














I got so many gasps!!!
Later, when the judges were deliberating, the contestants went back out on stage two by two for the audience to take photos. This time I changed right in front of them instead of behind the screen and I still got gasps!

Then I spent the next hour switching back and forth so that people could see how it was done because it was apparently too fast for people to figure it out even when I did it in front of them.
And I won best presentation for a journeyman! Yay!

(All photos are by Real Time Portrait Studio. Thanks Scott!)

Am I blue...take two

It seems I'm on a blue streak.
(Hmmm...is that what happens when you streak in winter...)

Anyway...

On the last episode of "As the Worlds Costumes" our heroine (Crafty Lady) was rushing frantically to make her first Regency. Did she finish on time? Did it fit? Was she eaten by zombies at the premier of the movie?

Tune in today for the answers to all these questions and more!

(Yes. Yes. and Don't be silly.)

In the end, I didn't have time time to make the gauze overdress, but that can wait. The dress turned out rather nicely for a first time I thought.
Here is the group photo at the movie:

And here's a closeup of me:

I got the professional shot at Cotume Con in Madison, WI. Scott from Realtime Portrait Studios  was there. He always does such a great job of taking our photo at Teslacon that I had shots of all my costumes done.

Funny...all of my costumes that I took were either blue or green. I didn't plan it that way, though.

On the next episode of "As the Worlds Costumes"...
How was Costume Con? Did our heroine compete? And how were all of her crazy costuming friends?
Tune in next week to find out!

Funnies!

The Pragmatic Costumer has just posted a hilarious timeline of fashion history from 1770 to 1920.
Check it out!
https://thepragmaticcostumer.wordpress.com/2016/06/24/the-genteel-fashionistas-dialogue-a-humorous-timeline-of-fashion/

Change of plans

Well, I had planned on starting my competition outfit for Costume-Con this weekend.

But...

A group from my local costume guild agreed to go with me to Pride & Prejudice & Zombies when it opens in a few weeks. Jane Austin and zombies! How can you beat that?

So now I'm making my first Regency costume!

Which means that I finally got to dig out the La Mode Bagatelle pattern for a lady's Regency wardrobe that I bought a decade ago and never used.

 

After a quick overview of my fabric inventory notebook, I realized that I had fabric to make the bodiced petticoat undergarment and some fine cotton gauze for an overdress, but nothing suitable for the main dress.

Cue a quick run to Joann Fabrics!

And there I found that there's not a lot of thin or sheer cotton to be found in the middle of winter.
Go figure.

Anyway...I found a nice blue semi-sheer cotton with a woven stripe. Just right. :-)

Got all of my pattern cut out tonight, so I'm all ready to sew up a storm tomorrow.

Wish me luck!