Costume plans 2014

The new year is here and it's time to announce my costume plans for the coming year. I've been thinking about these ones for quite some time, but now it's time to finally make them public and start some serious planning. Basically I can say that my costuming year for the last years have been divided into two parts. The first six months are dedicated to 18th century, due to the fact that I know that there is an 18th century even at the end of June, and the rest of the year is Star Wars, so that I can have something finished for the sci-fi con in December. This year a lot of my planning will also take Star Wars Celebration Anaheim into account. It's going to be in Anaheim in April 2015, but I don't want to stress to have my costumes finished for it. I've also tried to be quite restrictive in my plans, I rather finishe fewer but better projects than doing a long list and not be happy about the quality of my work. The list is divided into major projects, UFO:s and maybes.

First of all though. My biggest project when it comes to sewing will be to complete my sewing section in my living room. My apartment isn't big enough that I can have a dedicated sewing room, and up until now I've just had a working desk in my living room. In November I packed away all my sewing stuff, and other things, put up new wall papers, and now I'm going to buy furniture so that I can have a proper work space. Part of creating this space is also to get a proper dress form in the beginning of the new year.

Major projects

My biggest project of the year will be to reproduce this Parisian fashion plate from 1787. I've loved it
ever since I stumbled upon it. The simple white dress, that's not quite a chemise à la reine, the shortsleeved military style jacket, and not the least the gigantic hat above her enormous hedgehog.

For this project I will need to learn how to draft both the gown and jacket basically from scratch, I will need to learn millinery for the hat, and style a wig. I will also need to make a new pair of stays, since my 18th century stays would be visible if I only wore the gown and they are also earlier in style.

If I hadn't been so happy about the Snow White costume I did, I would not have dared to go into a project like this, but now I'm quite excited.

I want to have the whole project finished by the end of June.

I will tag this project "Revolutionary"

Star Wars Episode I - The Golden Handmaiden gown.

I've loved this costume for a really long time, but I haven't thought that it would be worth the time and money to actually make it. This is going to be my main costume for Star Wars Celebration, and I want to enter it into the costume contest there. It's also a challenge because in all my years of involvement in Star Wars costuming I've never seen a proper version of this gown. I've seen simplified versions, but a fully pleated gown has never been made.

Challenges involves pleating the fabric of the gown, smocking the obi belt, and not the least finding fabrics in the right colours. I'm also lucky in that this costume was at Star Wars: The Exhibition in 2008, and I took a lot of detailed photos of it. I'd say that there are a couple of details that I myself didn't catch until after several years of looking at pictures of it.
The time frame for this is to have it finished by the end of the year.
This project will be tagged "gold handmaiden".

UFO (unfinished objects)
My only major UFO is my female tusken. I have a new mask that I need to assemble, and a leather pouch that I need to put the finishing touches on. The reason why it's an UFO is that I'm waiting for an armor party so that I can get help by guys who are a lot better than me when it comes to working with hard materials.


Maybes
This is Winter Celchu from the book Star Wars: Scoundrels. I've been thinking about a comfy costume that I could run around in at cons, and still being in costume. It's a basic costume of a leotard and a tunic with a belt. The main challenge would be to replicate the trim. This costume might have to wait until 2015, so that I can just have it done for Star Wars Celebration in April.

When I was in London I bought that lovely wool that would make a really nice 18th century jacket, and I have the book "Costume Close-Up", with a nice chapter on a jacket from the Williamsburg collections. I could very well see myself starting on that as well.

Touch ups
I also have a couple of costumes that needs some serious overhaul. First in line for that is my classic Princess Leia. The white gown is starting to look like it's coming straight from the trash compactor, so I've said to myself that I will not use it again. I need to make a new one before being Leia again.

The Can Can trooper needs a new corset, but I think that is going to be pushed back to 2015 as well, and it depends if I'm going to bring it to Celebration or not.

I want to trim the Snow White gown to make it less of a fairytale costume and more proper 18th century. I will try to make that right at the start and finish it for the first challenge of the Historical Sew Fortnightly 2014.

Historical Sew fortnightly
As you can see on the bade on my sidebar I've also signed up for the Historical Sew fortnightly 2014. I completed a few challenges for the HSF2013, and I'm hoping to do more in 2014. I will try to plan my revolutionary gown so that I can use as many challenges as possible for that, but I might also get inspiration to do more historical gowns. Since the Gold handmaiden gown is clearly modeled on a fortuny gown from the early 20th century I might be able to use it as well. It's a bit hard to have fixed plans though since it's only the first six challenges that have been posted.

So that's it for my plans this year, now it's only to start gathering material, patterns and start sewing.