Happy Halloween!

Did any of you dress up as musical characters? If you were, send me your pics! I'd love to show them off for you! (I was Emma Pillsbury from Glee!)

Speaking of which, here is the amazing Popular costume Brittany wanted to share with you guys. it's fabulous! Just be aware: this entry has a lot of full-sized images, for you old fogeys on dial-up!

Brittany says:

I used Simplicity 5006 for the top. I just used the corset and I had to modify the pattern to fit correctly.

Kwik Sew 3783 view B for the skirt. On this I only made the skirt because I didn’t need the top.

I tried to match everything as closely to the real dress as possible, but unless you know where they got their fabric and you have their pattern that’s not going to happen. J

I found the sparkly pink fabric after looking at JoAnn’s and Wal-Mart and a few other local fabric places. I can’t remember the name of the fabric but it is in the special occasion fabrics and its not had to miss.J

For the lining fabric I wanted to go with a lighter pink, but the lighter pink gave the fabric an odd color. So, I went with a darker pink to make the hot pink in the dress pop.
 
CORSET
 


So the corset was fun to make (Much sarcasm with some honestly.) Instead of sewing the sparkly fabric together and sewing the solid pink fabric together and then sewing both to each other, I laid each matching piece together and sewed it like it was one piece to make the body of the corset.

I followed all directions for sewing, placing boning, and placing grommets as the directions said to do. The tricky part was doing the gathering thing over the bust and the ribbons.
For the gathering over the bust, I took a piece of the pink sparkly stuff and measured from side seam to side seam and doubled that measurement. I took that material and gathered it so it would all fit from side seam to side seam. I sewed that on as shown. (Note: it would be best to do this before you sew in the boning. J) I folded the excess over the top and sewed that on. (Rather badly because it was really hard and I got frustrated.)

For the ribbon, I was going to hand sew all of this, but it looked really bad and the ribbon started to fray. With my mom’s help we hot glued all the ribbon, which made it look a million times better and took way less time.
Note on fitting: I went down a size because the last corset I made with a Simplicity pattern was too big, so I went down a size. Even after going down a size it was still to big so I had to add a seam. 
The straps I just took the sparkly fabric and made straps like how they showed in the Kwik Sew pattern. I criss-crossed them which helped the fit in the bust area.


SKIRT

The skirt was really easy to make, except I like to make things difficult. I wanted to make the skirt WAY fuller than the pattern had allowed to I doubled the fabric for the ruffles ONLY. So, if it said cut 2 I cut 4.

I only did three layers because it looked good with three and I didn’t want to take the time to attempt to make another. (Plus, the pattern was for three. J)

For the waistband, I used grosgrain ribbon. I measured my waist and doubled the length needed. For example, my waist measured 32 inches, so I got two yards. I secured it with hook and eye closures.

  I had to add a panel underneath because it was rather see through. To do that I used the solid fabric and used just the pattern pieces that were between the ruffles for this. (Sorry if that doesn’t make sense. I can take a picture to illustrate.)


ACCESSSORIES

Since I was trying to spend as little as possible on this dress I tried to use things I already had. The shoes were old shoes from when I used to dance. The purse and necklace were from my senior prom. The flower was the only thing I bought. (Well, recently.) I got it a Clarie’s and it was on sale.


 
PRICE
I’m not really sure how much all this cost me. I had some unforeseen expenses like adding more material than I thought I would need. But, I already had the corset pattern, the accessories (except the flower), most of the boning, and the grommets.

Great job, Brittany! I love how insanely detailed it is! General note: if you don't have a hot glue gun, another no-sew option for attaching ribbon (for inquiring minds, haha!) is fabric glue. You'll need to pretty much soak it in the glue to make it adhere, but it does work.
Also, the three layered is way more flattering, I think! The four layers in the show can kind of look awkward. The fabric choice is spot-on--I love the sparkle! And the accessories are brilliant. =D