For the “pix or it didn’t happen” crew, get a costume or two up ya.

(Also: please excuse my shame in the Nazgul photo, I didn’t realise my “bib” was showing. I will now commit hara kiri.)

My Costuming Tips That Nobody Asked For:

1. Where possible (i.e. if the costume dictates), use natural fabrics. Especially for anything remotely Medieval. Cotton, silk, linen, muslin, calico, sackcloth, wool. Your underarms/crotch will thank you at the end of the day.

2. Head straight to the upholstery department for any costume set either in outer space, an invented history, or before 1910. Dress fabrics in velvets, burnouts, brocades and other fancy finishes/weaves are $$$; the same thing designed for a curtain or a couch is probably a third of the price and twice as wide.

3. I hate stretch panne velvet.

4. HATE IT.

5. Don’t forget to age/weather your costume! (Again, if the costume dictates.) Things you can use (I have used all of these): stage makeup, wax, wire brushes, sandpaper, electric knives (BE CAREFUL), quick-unpickers, tea, coffee, food dye, watered down kaolin clay, powdered clay, leaving fabric on the washing line for three weeks, commercial facial masks (clay-based), charcoal, watered down gouache or water-based paints, thinned-out dyes, candles, hair-dryers, gutters, hairspray, dirt. I haven’t used an orbital sander but I’ve heard they get results.

6. Hand-dyeing your own fabrics will give you a nervous breakdown, but it’s worth it.

7. Don’t neglect your hair/wig and makeup unless you want to look like you’re in the final dress rehearsal of the school musical. A great costume means dick if from the neck up you look like you’re popping down to the shops. By the same token, great hair and makeup can lift an average costume.

8. Pockets! Sew pockets into everything! Pockets!! That handbag or backpack is not screen accurate! POCKETS!!

9. Don’t discount hand-sewing. You’ll get blisters and go blind but you can’t beat it for finicky work or anything that needs to look like it wasn’t made on a sewing machine because, for instance, they didn’t exist when your costume was worn on-screen/in print.

10. If your costume needs heels, you really can’t go past Pleaser/Bordello (and their various subsidiaries). Their shoes are designed to be worn (and danced in!) for long periods, and are also a) awesome, b) pretty cheap, and c) predominantly vegan (if that matters to you).

And finally:

11. Your body-shape and size is completely immaterial and also fuck anyone who says you’re too short/tall/fat/thin/disabled or the “wrong” colour or gender to cosplay any character you damn well choose.

All The Costumes I’ve Made

I was thinking today about what it’s like to have a wardrobe of rather elaborate costumes, and trying to remember exactly what I’d made. Here they is, in order of when I made them:

• Silk Spectre I/Sally Jupiter (Watchmen movie version)
• Night Elf Druid (World Of Warcraft, low level gear)
• Neytiri (Avatar)
• Wikus Van Der Merwe (District 9 - sadly I had to relinquish the arc gun)
• Jessica Rabbit (Who Framed Roger Rabbit?)
• Catra (She-Ra: Princess Of Power - Scratchin’ Sound action figure)
• female Tusken raider (Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Clones)
• Grima Wormtongue (Lord Of The Rings: The Two Tower)
• Rorschach (Watchmen movie version)
• Nazgul (Lord Of The Rings: Fellowship Of The Rings)
• Leeloo (The Fifth Element)
• Dolphin (DC comics)
• Emma Frost (X-Men First Class)
• Loki (female form - Marvel Comics)
• Dorothy Michaels (Tootsie)
• Eowyn (Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers - refugee outfit, without coat)

The cheapest to make was probably Neytiri (unless you count man hours spent painting stripes on the back of my legs), the most expensive was Jessica Rabbit (endless pattern fuckups that led to endless amounts of fabric purchased). The most complex, and thus satisfying, is a tie between the Tusken and the Nazgul (in which I’m a good 6’11”). The most fun to wear was Dorothy Michaels, and the most irritating is a tie between Grima and the Tusken. I hand-sewed the entire Eowyn costume in a hotel room in Wellington.

And that’s my story by Clam Bistro.

Clam logic: get paid, begin Cersei costume.

BANG, just bought it, see you at Comic Con

GUISE, is there any significance to the birds embroidered on Cersei’s gown, or are they just decoration? I don’t want to stick a parrot on there if it’s meant to be a crane or some shit.

Thanks to Ellen and the team at Hollywood Wigs (6530 Hollywood Blvd) for doing an AMAZING job styling my Effie Trinket wig!

(And yes, I do store and photograph all my wigs in the kitchen.)

When I get down in the dumps about having to prep my costumes for SDCC, I like to remind myself that I managed to do this last year.

Haven’t attached or weathered the patches yet, but still…!!!

[deep breath] AAAAAAAAHHHHHH