soft and has a really nice shimmer that I hope does show up at least a little in the pictures (in the artist's work, there's a huge difference between the highlights and the shadows). I made the pattern from scratch, using a couple of my shirts as an outline, from which I created a prototype to adjust the fit and so on. The brown material turned out to be very difficult to work with as it frayed almost as soon as it was cut and was very slippery, so much so that my sewing machine was not happy with it at all. It closes with velcro at the front. The trim is bias tape with floral wire hotglued into it (the hotglue added to the stiffness) and yes, it is woven in and out of itself exactly as in the reference pictures. Unfortunately, the lace doesn't show up as much as it should and often the bias tape isn't seen clearly while I have it on, thanks to the tie, which is probably too long.
Collar: Made out of another material I really like, which is the same stuff I used for my Xianghua top. I took apart an old shirt and used its collar as a basis for this, after altering it to get the sailor-ish back of the collar (pictures soon, hopefully) even though it's hidden by my hair all the time. =\
Tie: Same material as my Setsuna jacket. Once again proved to be a difficult material to work with, for the same reason as with the brown. Fray check stains this material, so it wasn't an option. This tie is lined with the extra material from my kanako skirt. The orange part is orange fabric paint (I used masking tape to get that straight edge) and the strange little bits below the knot of the tie were made out of an orange hair elastic and a lot of embroidery floss.
Hair, Eyes, Glasses: My natural hair, parted differently. I layered my hair and cut bangs before my school formal in February specifically so that this costume would be more accurate. Embla's eyes, so far as I can tell, are brown like mine, so I didn't need contacts. The glasses are the same ones as I used for Megumi at CNAnime '02 and yes, I got sick of people poking through them to see if there were lenses.
Skirt: I hate to admit it, but I actually screwed up on one side of the skirt because I forgot to pay attention to the grain line in relation to the other pieces. Had I the opportunity to re-make this skirt, I would shorten it as well as shortening the top (so you can better see the detailed bias taping). A lot of time and effort went into that floating grid pattern you see at the top of Embla's skirt and I think I replicated it fairly well. I also made the skirt in four different pieces (three at the front and one at the back) just as appears in the artwork. I love the skirt on this costume and it makes me feel really accomplished. I did, however, make it too big and it tends slip around my waist and often the slit ends up being too far forward. For info on the bias tape, see the shirt construction. The other detail on the skirt is the string/chain that's attached to either side of the slit. There are three rings involved in this, plus two beads and a rectangular piece with two holes through it in addition to the chain/string. The rings are pipecleaner, the beads are well...beads, the rectangular piece is craft foam wrapped in pleather (I used an exacto knife to carve out the holes) and the chain is made up of 15 pieces of a gold elastic string which I braided together. Strangely enough, the chain was the most tedious and time-consuming part of the entire costume.
Stockings and Shoes: Unlike the thigh-highs I bought for my Chelsea costume, the ones I bought for Embla were a dream to work with. Unfortunately, they were not dark enough, but my only options were this lighter more skin-coloured tone or black and I felt that it would be better to go with this option. These actually stayed up without the help of garters, which was good because I never did find garters anywhere (not even when I went into La Senza for the first time in my life...purely for finding garters for this costume!). The shoes were ones I bought for my jrock cheerleader costume as the base for my knee-high boots, but those never got made and these shoes ended up becoming Embla shoes. Unfortunately, they're VERY large compared to my feet, so I had to stuff the toes, which makes walking very, very painful. I think that they're surprisingly close to her shoes, however, which is why I never looked for better fitting shoes.
Lab coat: The labcoat I was originally going to use belonged to my uncle, which could have housed me and my hypothetical twin quite easily. Instead, Reiciel gave me her old lab coat and I used that instead. ^o^ It worked really well and I actually really like her lab coat, so I wish I didn't have to permanently sew things to it. It's comfy. The arm patch was using the back of some leftover pleather bordered with electrical tape and I painted the design on with orange fabric paint that I also used on Xianghua.
Other: Fake garters were actually straps from my black strapless bra and attached to little loops of bias tape I sewed into the thigh-highs. ^_^ |
