Kili Project - Scabbard strap

With HobbitCon just around the corner, I found out I would try on Rik's Kili costume, just for fun, to see if it actually fit, and it did! Inspired by this sudden delightful surprise, I did a quick make up and hair and realised (to Rik's horror) that I might actually make a pretty decent Kili myself! The idea formed in my head that I could actually participate in the costume competition at HobbitcCon, as Kili instead of Tauriel. As much as I love my Tauriel cosplay, I've put down a ridiculous amount of time, money and effort with the Kili costume, way beyond what I've done with Tauriel, and it would be amazing to be able to showcase that work through a competition (especially if the rumors are true and Richard Taylor (yes, THE Richard Taylor of Weta Workshop) IS in the judge panel). Therefore, after putting it down to a vote on my Instagram and Facebook account, Kili won through with way over half the votes!

Great! This will be awesome! At least that's what I thought a first. And then my compulsions kicked in ...

"I'll have to make the coat now! I don't have time for that ... But I can make the quiver/sword strap! I have time for that! And maybe the bracers? I could have time for that (possibly) ... And the gloves? That's pushing it."

As you can see, I have a nasty tendency of getting in over my head, but at least I've gotten better at calling myself out on it. I made the strap. Well, technically, I'd already made the strap, as a scabbard for the sword for the premiere, but it was just a simple leather strap, no embellishments, so I modified it look like the one in the movie. I might make the bracers if I have time tonight. Possibly.

Anyway, here's progress photos! And me as Kili! ^_^

Making more studs out of fimo clay:

Drilling holes in the corners of the studs for sewing, oh, and the buckle:

Gluing the studs and the leather pieces onto the strap:

Putting on the overlaying leather that attaches the buckle to the strap and gluing that too on:

Getting an idea of how it's gonna look before securing the studs by sewing the corners to the leather:

The finished product (I apologize for the messy background, I'm messy, I know, Rik keeps telling me off for it):

Me as Kili:

Tauriel Bracers

Having finished the bodice, I started to work on a new pair of bracers that would match it. The old ones are too tight and rigid to be comfortable and they're made out of the same thick suede I used for the old bodice, and are spray painted the same way. Good last resort, but hardly impressive. I had to make new ones!

I used the old bracers as a pattern and cut out four copies; two in a thinner, brown suede material, and two in the same thin leather that I used for the bodice.

I could probably have wrapped it up quite quickly if I hadn't decided to decorate the bracers with gold thread embroidery. I sat down, found some reference pictures, which are pretty few and hard to come by, so I opted for an original freehand design that took on some of the style from the fragments I could find pictures of. Using baking paper, I traced the pattern and taped the paper to the suede side of the thin leather (the gold thread is quite fragile, so I only used it on the under thread, thus, to get the gold on the right side, I had to sew it with the suede side up).

After that, I simply sewed the pattern with my sewing machine, using the freehand embroidery fuction. It was rather time consuming, and it sometimes turned out a little different than the design, but on average, I'm pretty happy with the result.

Then came the tedious process of removing the baking paper! It was truly such a bother, I decided to go for some silk paper for the second one, and that definitely made it easier as I didn't have to worry about ruining the seams when I pealed it off.

With the embroidery done on both pieces, I started to peg (those wonderful pegs again) the supple, thin leather to the more rough and rigid suede leather, and stitched the two layers, also with gold under thread. And that's what I've done so far. Next, I'll be sorting out some sort of closures,  hut I'm still trying to come up with one that both looks good and is functional.

I think they turned out rather nice, though! What do you think?

Tauriel Bodice

After I had stitched together the leather pieces as demonstrated in my last post, I also did the lining and attached some channels for boning to the latter. Using thin spiral steel boning gives the bodice the rigidity it needs, and yet allows it to remain flexible enough for comfort.

I sewed together the leather and the lining and proceeded to sort out the lacing in the back, inserting boning at the end piece and then eyelets for the lacing. Only to realize I'd made the whole thing a bit too wide; even lacing it all the way in, it looked and felt slack, so I had to do some cheating on the back panels to get rid of a couple of inches. That worked a treat!

Moving on from here, I started to work on the "winged" sweetheart neckline and straps. This was a fiddly process, but I got it right in the end, with the help of some pegs (!), and now, all that remains is to attach the two last bits on the straps, and then attach the latter in back!

Tauriel - Bodice progress

Using one of the two leather coats I originally bought for the Kili project, I started cutting out the pieces for the new bodice. I also made an extra set in a thick cotton and polyester mix material for lining. Pinning them together, I sewed them together:

It then ended up looking a bit like this. Now, I know the original doesn't have a seam in the middle of the front panel, but I was running out leather and had to compromise.

Having stitched it all together, it looked like this. I'm currently working on boning and the lining, so there will be a new update as soon as I've got that fitted. :)

Tauriel Upgrade

I did it. I bought tickets for HobbitCon 2014. And now I've started the stupidly time consuming task of upgrading my Tauriel costume! The one I made for the premiere of The Desolation of Smaug carries all the hallmarks of being a de-prioritised side project, so I feel like I owe it to the costume to make jt better!

I'm starting with the leather bodice, which is the part of the costume I was the most unhappy with. The upgraded version will be made out of thin, napped leather from an old leather coat, and lined with thick cotton canvas. I'll be probably add some spring steel boning as well to give it a bit more rigidity.

I have already made a pattern for the mock-up,  mainly by making test bodice in cotton and then cutting it up again for the correct placement of seems, pretty much the same way I made the pattern for the tunic sleeves. (I only cut up half of the test bodice, leaving the remaining half as a pattern for the lining.) From here, I'll need to cut the pieces for the mock-up and sew it all together to check for any adjustment requirements that may pop up.

This is how it looks so far:

I'll give some more updates when I've done more! :)

Kíli Project - Dwarf ears and Kili's sword!

I hadn't planned to do anything about my fella's ears for the costume, as I didn't really have any means to do anything about it and it'd be one more thing to worry about, but then, whilst in the ticket queue, a friend of mine said that she could help me sort it! She's currently doing a course in special effects and movie make-up, and knew exactly how to do it, however, she needed a cast of my fella's ears to make them. So after the queue, we met up and she equipped me with everything I needed to do so!


With the usual bribe of tea, dwarfy boy lay down on the floor and got his ear covered with alginate goo poured into the bottomless q-tip holder I had him hold in place around his ear. It didn't take very long to set, and we could easily wiggle it out of the holder and off his ear. The same process was repeated on the other side, and then I made a sort of wall out of plaster tape around the mold, so I could pour in the plaster to make a cast. A word of advice, though, use duct tape instead. It'a a lot easier and a lot less messy! ;)




After a while, the plaster had set, and I could peel off the alginate, carefully, so I didn't break anything, to reveal two lovely casts!
























After that, all that was left for me to do, was to wrap them up and bring them to my friend, who sorted the rest out and made us, not just a set of gelatin ears, but also a silicon mold to go with the casts so that we can make new sets ourselves! ^_^

Now, also whilst in the queue, I was showing another friend of mine a picture of Kili's sword from United Cutlery's collection, and telling her how much I wanted it for the costume, but that it's too pricey for me, unfortunately. She loved it too, and then she surprised me by saying, 'you know, I could probably make that in wood, as long as you can paint it'. I was kind of gobsmacked and asked her how much she wanted as payment for making it for me, and she just said she didn't want anything; she'd just do it for fun! I still feel like I owe her big time, because she really did an awesome job! It turned out to be quite the co-operation project as dwarfy boy helped out with the base coat layer of the paint and did the blade, and then I finished it off by painting all the details and sorting out the leather on the handle. Here's the result:

Kíli Project - Belt and Hair

Kili's belt. This is one part of this project that I've been dreading and putting off for, like, forever. Not only does it involve having to do a shit ton of hand stitching, it's hand stitching thick leather, and I also have to make all the studs that are to be stitched on. I already had the old belt I'd be converting into this magnificently vicious little number, and removed the original belt buckle a while back, so I started where I had to; making the studs. I'd already made one as a prototype, if you will, but now, I would have to mass produce them as I needed somewhere in the vicinity of 25 of them. Nothin' to it but to do it. Equipped with my favourite biscuits, my faithful Aperture Science mug filled to the brim with coffee and milk and other useful tools, I dived in and got it done!

From there, the path of hellfire lay before me, also known as hand sewing leather. It hurts you wrists, it hurts you neck (because you inevitably end up sitting with you neck craned over whatever you're working on) and it hurts your fingers, sometimes quite a lot, because there are moments when you can't use the thimble, and that's when it strikes, the unexpected needle puncture in you index finger tip, for the umpteenth time. Ok, I'm done ranting now.

The belt buckle was the easy bit. I could just sew that through the holes already there from where the old belt buckle had been attached. The nightmare was all those bloody studs that needed to be stuck onto this leash of doom. I did this by drilling little holes (using a mini drill my fella uses for wargaming miniatures) into each inner corner of each stud, so that I'd have some way of sewing them on. Then I put some glue and stuck it onto the leather. From there, I drilled through the leather as well, so as to spare my hands a little bit. Then the actual sewing began, stitching each corner so that the thread would lie firmly in the grooves on either side of the corner. Repeat 20 something times. You could say I was very relieved and quite pleased with myself once it was done.




Since I had the fimo clay out already from making the studs, I figured I might as well make Kili's hair clip, or at least my version of it. I'd seen one version someone had made of it, and I liked the pattern they'd used, and although I had no idea if it's screen accurate or not (still don't), I decided to use it. I was very happy with how it turned out, and the fact that it's actually functional. :)


Having received the hair extensions for my fella earlier (his hair was getting rather long but it wasn't long enough, thus extensions), I cut them to the right length and had the poor chap sit down to get have them put in. (He wasn't all too pleased, but as usual, the promise of a brew made him more co-operative.) I must say that the result was perfect, in my opinion, and you could hardly tell which bit was extensions and which bit was his own hair.

This  all happened after having attached the trim onto the leather jacket, but before I stitched the gambeson sleeves on, so here are some photos of how it looked on along with the hair: