Vampire Eras, Finished

Here are our vampire dresses, finished! Mine was made using the "Shakespeare in Love" style Elizabethan pattern by Simplicity, now out of print. My sister's is the Josephine-style Regency pattern by Butterick. I took the train off and raised the neckline on hers, and skipped the skirt's cartridge pleating on mine, but other than that I followed the patterns pretty closely. The black crushed velvet is fantastic stuff we bought online from Sy Fabrics, the colored organza fabrics were clearance table finds at JoAnn's (blue--leftover from the Beauxbatons collars) and Hancock's (purple). Probably my favorite fabric was my underskirt and sleeves, which was a black crushed organza that I found on the Walmart $1 table. Bottom line cost on both gowns was probably $25 each. Not too bad!

Vampire Eras, Step One!

So this year's crazy Halloween theme centers around vampires. (Basically, my friends and I just wanted an excuse to make cool, gothic-inspired dresses.) We originally planned to be a bit more matchy-matchy, but it's evolved into kind of a neat idea--each one of us will be wearing a style from a different era. So perhaps were got stuck with the fashion sense of the time we originally lived in pre-vampire? Anyway, my friend (and fellow Beauxbaton) is doing Tudor with a twist, my sister is going Regency (possibly with a miniskirt!), and I'm going Elizabethan. Mainly so I can recycle my costume to be Titania for our school's Shakespeare carnival too. =)

Anyway, here's today's progress--the embroidery for my bodice. Not much to show for hours of watching my Bernina struggle with metallic thread and rethreading every three minutes or so. (Thread's fault, not the machine's, I think.) But I'm quite happy with the finished product. All three dresses will have black crushed velvet bodices, with organza skirts in a jewel tone layered over black lining.

Fleur Costuming 101

Since I've had a few requests for more specifics on this costume, here's some help, pattern and fabric-wise, for those who may want to make their own.

Fabric:
The blue silk-like material for the dresses is called silkessence, and I've only found it at JoAnn's. It's fabulous stuff--washes and wears like a dream, doesn't require much ironing, and it's CHEAP! (We got ours on sale for like $1.50 per yard--always use a coupon!) A great alternative to cheap costume satin, which I despise using. =)

The collars and cuffs are out of organza--I got it at JoAnn's too, and the color was called old blue, I believe? It was on clearance for $1 per yard.

Patterns:
For the dress, we used this pattern, believe it or not--McCall's costume pattern 4889. We changed the neckline to a simple round one for the peter pan collar, and combined the upper and lower sleeve into one pattern piece. Oh, and made it knee length. I spent a lot of time making the collar "just right" by looking at screen caps from the film, but honestly, nobody is going to see it with your cape on! So save yourself some trouble. As long as your pattern is empire waisted with a flared skirt and long sleeves, you'll have the right look.

For the cape, we used a pattern for a capelet (McCall's 5006), but it had shoulder seams I had to draft out. Honestly, you're better off just cutting out a circle (well, it's more oval-ish). Ours are almost a full circle and that's something I'd change--I'd cut away the front edges (so it's a more 3/4 circle) rather than trying to have them meet. We were constantly flipping them back so you could see the collars of our dresses underneath.

I'll put the underdress on my dressform and take some photos soon so you can see that without the cape. Right now I'm in the middle of making two vampire dresses--yes, Twilight fever has caught us all, hasn't it? =)