Since I am apparently insane, I’ve decided to make another costume before Katsucon, which is less than three weeks away. It’s not even a simple costume – it’s actually pretty difficult and elaborate.

But it is also very, very pretty! 

This costume is of a Sakizo design…but it’s a very detailed oriented one so what I have sewn so far doesn’t look much like it (at least not yet). Because of this, I’ll post the reference picture i’m using in the next post relating to this costume.

I will probably have one or two more posts about this. It shouldn’t take me long to finish since everything is just detail work. The next post I made will talk about sleeves and beading so make sure to check back for updates!

I had draped a sweetheart neckline princess seamed bodice pattern a few weeks ago, which I decided would work well enough for this project. I actually took photos throughout the draping process since I get asked about pattern drafting a lot and plan to make a tutorial later.

Here are a few pictures, all you really do is pull, pin, draw, and cut the fabric until it’s the shape you want.

When removed from the form the pieces looked like this.

Once seam allowances were added I had a pattern!

I know that seems like a lot of work, but it only takes twenty minutes or so.

I cut the pattern I had made out of muslin and measured out 1.5 inch stripes onto the pieces. I also sewed a mixture of metal and plastic boning into the bodice. Then I drew out the neckline I wanted.

This is how the boning placement looked when flat. Most of it’s plastic but I did add a few metal stays.

Once the boning was removed everything got labeled to make reassembly easier.

And then each stripe was cut apart.

And then I used those as a pattern for cutting out my fabric! I choose red cotton sateen, gold spandex, and an ivory silk satin for this project. All the materials have really nice textures and drape beautifully, plus I had them laying around. The spandex was reinforced so it doesn’t stretch.

Once assembled it looks like so!

I cut out the same pattern for lining and drew out the boning placement.

With boning sewn in~

Then it was attached to the bodice.

And here it is just pinned, also ignore the flowers, they were a stand in.

I had to go through and hand sew each seam down. This was made slightly less tedious by the fact I watched disney movies throughout working on it. And then pearls were sewn over each seam.

At this point I cut out my skirt, the front consists of two 30×56″ panels of cotton sateen and a 40″x56″ panel of silk satin. I made the panels longer than they needed to be so I could add a large hem later on. I didn’t want any stiffening in the hem so this is a substitute to make it heavier.

I’m not sure why the stripes look uneven on the form…they are fine when worn.

Then I cut out the train! I have never made a dress with a train before this so it was quite the experiment. I sort of marked out various measurements and then cut out what I thought looked okay, it wasn’t a very technical process.

In the end I’m really happy with it, I think the shape is quite pretty!

[Please ignore how the top looks here]

Now that the base is done I can start on details mwaha. I got a bunch of trims on etsy which I’m super excited to add to this costume!

One of the ones I bought was this cute flower trim, which I took my sewing shears to right away and separated the flowers from the main trim.

Also shout out to The Store, who sells all these gorgeous hand dyed gold venice lace.

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I took the flowers and pinned them onto the upper portion of the skirt in a randomized pattern that faded down

I didn’t like how it looked at first, but it grew on me. I ended up [i’m embarrassed to admit this] hot gluing them all into place. Hand sewing 100 tiny flowers on didn’t seem appealing at all, and I didn’t think it would look that great. The glue ended up working really well.

Then I pinned the hem and pinned on this gorgeous lace that I ordered from here.

Sooo that’s everything for now.

Thank you for reading!