Whisper

Ah, the dawn of a new term is upon us, spring (well, winter) is in the air.. And so, it's only right that I actually wrap up what happened at the end of last term before the new project shuffles out of the starting block.

The last week of term was an absolute nightmare for me. I thought I was fairly well prepared in terms of how much I'd done, but I'd overemphasised some parts of the process that didn't necessarily need it. I'd spent ages lining the corset for instance, which wouldn't be seen by anyone! I'm like that sometimes.. I focus on the details while forgetting the bigger picture. But the piece as a whole was ready in time for the photoshoot, and in a better state construction-wise than many people's. I was disappointed with how some of the details turned out, but overall I feel it gave the right effect, and the costume and make-up gave the model a very powerful, regal air.

There will be prettier pictures once they're done copying over to my computer. The files are huge, and my dvd drive is currently trying to digest them with some difficulty. It sounds like a printer trying to chew up a raw steak..

For now, here is one of my own, taken with my humble little digital camera at the time.

Tags: Photoshoot | Corsets | theatre design | corsetry | costume design

Whisper

Hey, remember those scraps of fabric and bits of paper? They turned into something!

Follow the Read More link for more pictures!

Tags: theatre design | corsetry | costume design

Whisper

So as you can probably guess from the title, this week I've mostly been ploughing ahead with my corset. I've done a fair bit of work on the skirt too, though mostly that has been halted by the fact that the second batch of ping-pong balls I ordered were an ever-so-slightly different colour. Ack! Both sets are white-ish, but one is a pearly, gloss white, whereas the others are a matte, greenish shade. I like the former ones more, but the seller stopped selling them. :(

My plan is to make it up as usual, then spraypaint the whole skirt matte-white and decorate it with glue gun glue, in the long, pretty spider-web strings it's so good at making. Then I need to think about the net part, and ohh.. so much to do!

Tags: corsetry | theatre design | costume design | Corsets | sewing

VictoriaS

Here is sort of a short overview of what we've been doing in costuming. We've gone over a lot, from history to practical costuming knowledge. So I'm going to start with the grade sheet for the class.

Just a note. There are a LOT more pictures beneath the cut. :) So please press read more if you are even vaguely interested.

Tags: costume design | fashion design | Fashion History | projects

Whisper

Okay, so I promised myself that I'd get this done by the end of the week, and lo, here it is. :)

The Spider Queen design started off with this initial sketch, which most of you have probably already seen.

See below the cut for more pictures and information.

Tags: costume design | corsetry | theatre design | drawing | illustration | design

Whisper

The design for the Spider Queen is finally finished. Thanks to the feedback I got on the forums, I focused more on going for a grey/white corset. I went through a good few variations on this (and got utterly sick of drawing the costume by the end of it!), but I finally found one that I think fits. That'll have to be a teaser for now, as it's midnight and I haven't scanned any of the recent work just yet.

Currently I'm making the toile for the corset itself. It's based on a yellow-flossed black one from the Symington collection, (though I found the corset and pattern in Corsets: Historical Patterns and Techniques by Jill Salen. Scaling up the pattern took an age, and I'd have been utterly lost without inch-square marked pattern paper. That stuff is a godsend. Half of the toile is done now, since I've been getting progressively more and more tired, and thus have stitched wrong sides together countless times now. That'll teach me to sew when I'm tired.. :P Well, you know it never will, but there we go.

In other news, my dissertation research is going okay. I've chosen a question based around the use of animals as a metaphor for human behavior. It's got a lot of meat to it, and as a bonus I get to watch a tonne of old Don Bluth films and Looney Tunes, and call it research. Muahahahaha. Currently reading The Annotated Alice, for info on the background of the White Rabbit, Cheshire Cat, and other animal characters that featured prominently in Caroll's work. I'll have to read at least a chapter of Gulliver's Travels fairly soon, and *sigh* Animal Farm. It's an alright book, but I had to read it in school, and that sours any text for life.

Tags: corsetry | costume design | Corsets | toiles | drawing | theatre design | design

Whisper

I had a tutorial with the current head of this project on Tuesday. She seemed to like my work a lot so far, which was a big relief! I'm never sure if I've done enough or not. I'm fretting a bit over presenting a nice, written out workbook by the end of term.. I type up all my notes because my handwriting is a) appallingly slow and b) horribly messy. And typed up writing stuck into a sketchbook always looks a bit half-hearted. But, ah well. It's a long way off, and she didn't bring it up, so I'm just fretting.

I've uploaded a few more of the pictures I've done recently for my design. I've improved on it in places, and tried out variations on some of the detail.

Tags: corsetry | costume design | theatre design

Whisper

This is my initial design sketch for the Corsets and Structures course. The concept came to me after I became interested in the use of animals as metaphorical devices for human behavior. Spiders are often connected in this sense with tricksters and deceptive behavior, and in female characters in particular with the use of sensuality and sex to decieve males (in no small part due to the Black Widow's infamy). I wanted to subvert this by presenting an openly powerful female character who doesn't have to rely on tricks and guile. Many spiders, as opposed to the trickster trope, are strong and agile predators, the big cats of their ecosystem, and the females are no exception. I wanted to try and put this across in my Spider Queen design.

I think overall this is the direction I'm going to progress with. I'm going to lose the fishtail though, and instead make the net skirt more opaque. I really don't need the extra workload that would come with making a fitted fishtail skirt. Our Autumn term is quite short, so I wanted to make sure that I design a piece I can complete within the time we've been set. We have some of the third term set aside for finishing these pieces, but ideally I'd like that to be used for neatening up and perfecting bits before the exhibition, as opposed to a mad rush. Also, I know the initial sketch corset was delightfully vague, but upon further research I'm thinking that a late 19th Century shape would be best, or possibly 1900s. Going with the wasp-waisted shape was tempting due to the subject matter, but I felt it wouldn't really suit the overall design.

Tell me what you think! :)

Tags: corsetry | costume design | theatre design

Whisper

Okay, so I've managed to lose this message twice now, so I'll do it all in one lump this time!

Tuesday went.. well, it didn't really go anywhere. The tech support in our Uni building forgot that our tutor requested a slide carousel, so after announcements and going through the brief, there wasn't a whole lot left to do. So she arranged that we have 10 minute one-to-one sessions, except that the head of 3rd Year had forgotten to send out the letter requesting that we bring along preliminary work and research. Oh dear. Still, we got on as best we could in the 1-to-1 sessions, and she seemed to approve of my idea a lot (which I'll detail in a seperate post).

She'd initially planned a catchup lecture on Wednesday for us to see the lecture she'd originally planned, but for whatever reason it turned out that that couldn't happen. So I spent a while drawing out more makeup/facepaint designs for my concept, and doing some research on the influences and origins.

Nothing happened on Thursday either, so I spent the afternoon in the University Library, digging out the books I could find on corsetry, photocopying them with wanton enthusiasm (I'm not sure what I'm going to do with so many photocopies in my workbook, but having them to hand is endlessly useful) and loaning out the ones I thought would be helpful. I did another sketch of my costume design, tweaked it slightly and finished the alternative facepaint design.

Tags: university | costume design | lectures