Lady Althea Cosplay

The Subject: Lady Althea

I mainly decided to make Lady Althea's outfit because I love the gold embroidery on her outfit, and I felt that it would be a great challenge for me. Since I haven't made anything for myself in an incredibly long time, and I would love to have a costume to go to conventions with. Anywhoo, I started working on my costume last Friday, I went to Jo-anns and was kind of skeptical because sometimes they don't have quality fabric or not enough of the fabric, or its not the right color. But this time worked out perfectly, as soon as I walked into the store I was drawn to this purple suiting and to make matters even better the suiting had spandex in it. So I was thrilled because that would make fitting the bodice and etc that much easier.

The next dilemma that I had to think about was how was I going to problem solve my way through the gold details ( I run a six-head embroidery machine during the day but I felt like that would be too easy). The next thing I thought of was to couch down gold trim in the pattern that I needed to but, I still wasn't sure because I also knew that this would take an insane amount of time because Lady Althea has this on practically half of her costume. At the same time though it seemed the best way to replicate the intricate gold designs. I did end up buying the rest of this gold trim (14 yds.) because at that point in time I had no way of knowing how much I needed.

The main reason why I don't like Jo-anns is that they let you return fabric, which is good if you get the wrong type of fabric, but bad if your someone like me and want a seven yard piece. And that is precisely what happened to me when I went up to the counter to have my fabric cut, the bolt was in three pieces! Ugh! Luckily, there was a three yard piece, which I absolutely needed to have a continuous piece for her semi-wrap skirt. Overall, I was excited to have gotten all my supplies so I could get started.