Construction Details:

This was the Cosplay of Firsts: first boot covers, first gloves, first Major Wig Styling (RUN!). Also the first cosplay to be written on with red Sharpie, but hey...

The top and arm warmers are poplin-- I disassembled a top I got at the Salvation Army, modified it a bit to get poofier sleeves, the high collar, and a modesty panel of sorts, and then used that as pattern pieces. After swearing never to use poplin again, I am pleased with how the top came out. Jury is still out on poplin after all.

The corset is twill with a little bit of leftover pseudo-suede for the buckle straps. I went needlessly complicated on this one after deciding I did not want to use a zipper to hold it shut -- I have had very poor luck with zippers breaking lately. So the front is made up of two layers -- the under one laces shut, and the outer one is decorative and is held shut by velcro. The buckles are aluminum floral wire because I could not for the life of me find small silver rectangular buckles, and the silver strap-holders (seriously, what are those things called?) are another type of floral wire.

Skirt is also twill in a basic circle, and the boot covers are vinyl and twill since I couldn't find pleather in that shade of yellow (surprised?). My first boot covers! Thanks to Karmada for supervising and helping. I like how they came out, but then again I breathed in a lot of E-6000 fumes while making them, so maybe my memory's a bit skewed?

The gloves are more twill and were kind of a huge pain, but they fit my hands, so I'll call it a success!

The hat is suitings fabric with some heavy interfacing, a boa, and more floral wire for the flower, this time in bronze. Karmada made my soul gem from resin -- it's so shiny!

I got the socks from Sock Dreams (the Extraordinary Thigh Highs in Plum) and painted on the stripes with fabric paint, which took forever and left permanent stripes on my longbow case, which is what I wrapped the socks around. :P


Rifle is still in the works; stay tuned.

Personal Thoughts:

Finally I get to cosplay someone who shows emotion! ...for a few episodes, at least.

Styling Notes

This wig made me cry. Still does, actually. I used this tutorial (http://classewig.com/wig/blog/?p=1287) but used a pigtail wig so the curls weren't separate pieces. The process was fine, but when I went to curl the finished pieces, all the hair on the inside buckled and unfortunately looks rather messy. One attempt to fix this later and I ended up messing up the top part of the wig as well. Everyone I've talked to at cons seems to really like it, but I plan on doing it over at some point and making some modifications based on what happened the first time around.

Wig Review

I'm not sure I'll use another Leia. I LOVE Arda's wigs, but this one was almost too short on me from forehead to nape of the neck -- I have brown hair and it shows in the back, along with the edge of my wig cap, so I've asked friends to paint my hair yellow so it blends in. (Which means a LOT of time in the shower washing it out!) I was really surprised at the sizing issue since the website warns that it'll probably be too big on people with smallish heads (like me); I expected to have to shrink it and instead I found it was almost too small. Looking at other options right now, among them simply sewing some spare wefts onto the back to create some fringe that would cover my hair.

Also, how does she even walk with hair like that, let alone fight witches? Seriously, I had bouncy hair all day, which was fun but made it hard to move very fast. :P

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