12th Night Dress

When Caid 12th Night approached I remember saying that I was not going to make a new court dress for the event. I already had a good amount of court gowns I built in the past and I only wore them a few times.

Of course I say one thing and completely do another.

Here's my dress I wore to Caid 12th Night.

Pardon the wrinkles. 12th Night was at the beginning of the month and I just now managed to pull the dress back out from the garb laundry pile to take photos. Its made out of a lovely brown linen I bought up in the LA Fashion district. There was a linen sale. An SCA gal can never have enough linen.  The plus for using linen is this dress is now washable!

I used a different style of pattern than the one I drafted for my orange silk Italian Ren. I was trying to have a more 1520's Venetian silhouette so I changed the neckline and put the closure in the front.

This portrait was my main inspiration:

Palma Vecchio, 1520s: Woman In Blue

 I was completely taken with this portrait and wanted to create the same feel as it. I ended up only having a week to put the dress together (I caught the plague the week before) so there are parts that need refining. Overall, I think I did a decent job.

 Once again, Trim from a impulse by at war.  I KNEW it would come in handy! Do to the shape of the neckline I had to put it all on by hand. That.. was an adventure Alas, you can catch some scorch marks on the trim there. My iron was WAY too hot *facepalm*. The ties are made of simple grosgrain ribbon. the gold balls on the end are leftover buttons from some other project long forgotten. I thought they finished up the bodice nicely.

Ah yes, my "Special" moment. The trim was a bit of a nightmare to put on and I ended up with bizarre gap at the back of the neckline. So I added this little loopy bow detail on the back  I thought it was kinda a cute detail for the time I had. But I might change it out later on.

I really loved the red brocade I used for the sleeves. I lucked into a yard of it when a friend of mine was getting rid of his fabric stash. The diamonds are really pretty. 

Unfortunately I don't have any photos of me in the dress except one:

And the jazz hands in it are epic.

H.R.M. Steampunk Symposium

We had a great time vending the event and really enjoyed exploring the Queen Mary. What a great place for a steampunk event!

 

Of course the fun part for me was the dressing up. Colleen, also being a costumer, joined me with the costume fun. He has some great photos of us playing on the Queen Mary in costume that i will be stealing from her in the future.  Here we are dressed in Steampunk Romani  on our first day of vending.On Saturday I even donned the Regina "Reggie" Black costume which I put a few more details on. I'll be hunting some photos down soon.

 I only took a couple goof ball photos of us playing on the sundeck of the Queen Mary. Mainly of us trying to sneak into this locked door.

Most of the weekend was spent vending so I didn't see much of the con, luckily some awesome looking folks headed over to the booth to peek in on our wares.

Not only did this gentleman light up, but his winds were mechanized and moved up and down. Beautiful work!

Aw, I want a spray can full of the powder of Ibn Ghazi too!

These two were my favorites of week. Native American Steampunk. How awesome is that? This couple were extremely sweet too. LOVED their plague maskes especially.

ARRRR, ITS DRIVING ME NUTS.

Now that I'm fresh from the con, I'm already plotting to delve more into the costuming world. I especially would like to start on my Victorian walking dress and I am considering putting together a "Great White Hunter" costume for my husband...and a steampunk cowboy costume for him as well...for my own personal reasons..I love the period cowboys.

Hopefully I'll hunt down more photos to put up soon!