GL, Legion & Other Awesome Rings

I remember finding really great silver rings on ebay and then they stopped getting listed. Luckily, a regular over at the League of Heroes posted a link to Arroba Silver which is just what I originally bookmarked. The right GL ring is obviously vital if you are going to dress a Green Lantern; cool thing is that now there are other color Lanterns too and Arroba already has their logos available.

Also essential to rings would be a member of the Legion of Superheroes where rings and communicators are given when you are asked to join up. So for all the Phantom Girls and Beast Boys out there, you'll be able to find affordable LoSH rings now.

Rogue's yellow boots

I get asked about X-Men's Rogue a lot. The reason I love her is because her vast wardrobe reflects different periods of her life and therefore personality. Her classic yellow & green suit is by far the most popular of her collection.

Making the bodysuit and jacket are easy enough. With Rogue there are also a decent amount of accessories to consider too. To get the perfect "double" belt where one is thin and one is thick, you can either buy two brown belts and create an X-logo buckle to hold them together or have one custom made.

Boots can be tricky to have custom created because if you're like me and spend all day in your costume, you really want them to be as comfortable as possible. That means going shopping for yourself. Having someone who is not a boot-maker or cobbler create your footwear can be a hit or miss situation. Many people will just refer you to a tutorial on how to make your own but not everyone who enjoys wearing costumes wants to go through all the trouble involved in making one.

With the yellow & green suit, Rogue wears over-the-knee (OTK) yellow boots with green straps. They flare open at the top around the knee and thigh. If you don't care about being dead on accurate there are a lot of go-go boots that come up the knee but not over it; still, it's not a bad place to start because they only cost about $40 and have a variety of heels to choose from. You can always try to create the flared top yourself out of yellow vinyl which takes a lot of the daunting construction out of the equation.

Yesterday I scoured the internet again looking for yellow OTK boots and found these options:
- White boots (expensive; might mean better quality but I don't know; for cheaper and in US dollars check here) that you can try spray painting with a shoe paint like Magix.
- Spandex boots/leggings are common from Chinese costumer designers and can be found easily on ebay. The thing is the prices are cheap but shipping is costly. One Chinese designer that I've heard good things about is Maggie at Cosfun. She'll also do customizations so if you need a bootie in a color not shown, you can always ask about it. Booties though are very slippery and offer no protection for your feet! You can get some leather, foam or even an old yoga mat to cut out some soles for yourself and glue it onto the stockings.

Tutorials on Armor making at GEN

I recently joined the community of GEN, Girls Entertainment Network (open to guys too) and have been slowly going through the forum posts on costuming. My friend Belle Chere answered someone's question about How to Make Armor. Check out her wonderful response complete with photos of her Ivy Valentine gilded clawlike gloves.

A while ago, I found this website dedicated to making Halo armor.

The Rumor - Completed!

I got my boots (they aren't a perfect match but they're pretty nice) and finished the details on the jacket plus found my winter gloves for the final touch. Here's my completed Rumor from Umbrella Academy volume one for the Wizard Magazine Halloween Costume Contest. (Nothing like having a deadline in the middle of August!)

It feels really weird not to be completely covered in spandex.

Rumor 99% complete (Umbrella Academy)

Umbrella Academy's Rumor

I still have gloves, proper boots, and some embroidery on the jacket left to have this actually completed. I need to redo the red top and t-shirt at some point in the future but it's wearable for now.

Ebay Sales: Wizard of Oz

I have continued the major gleaning of my house and came across a couple of Bradford Exchange plates from the MGM Wizard of Oz collection. I had them listed on ebay years ago and for some reason two of them didn't sell. I still have the Tin Man and the Scarecrow. I have relisted them on ebay and have set 10% of the proceeds to go to Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation.

Now - as for ebay - there is no minimum bid however even sales with 10% going to a charity have a minimum to pay to the charity which is $5. So I would really appreciate the best offers possible on these plates.

Both plates are listed as separate sales. They are in their original boxes and have all original paperwork including the important Certificates of Authenticity.

Day Glow Jester completed!

By the end of Day 4, I actually had a wearable costume! It took about 28 hours with taking only half hour breaks to eat or run to the store. At least now I have a suit to start from so I can make some modifications. I'll probably design my own booties for Harley. I have to adjust the diamonds especially on the butt. I'm still trying to figure out what to do for the white cuffs. In these pictures, I just used some spare white trim from my Harley inspired tote bags. I'd like to round the bottoms more on the white neck piece too. The horns ended up pointing backwards too far.

Things I was really happy about where how I actually got the 4 corners of alternating color to line up in the front and the back. The hood zipper was a pain but the back zipper is the best zipper installation I've ever done. Of course I couldn't find too many color choices though so I went with white. For the sake of speed, I appliqued the diamonds on this one but I'll give gluing a shot with the next one.

Testing the Harley/Jester

Day 4: I feel like progress is so slow on my test version of Harley Quinn. I've worked out some of the kinks and think I'll make a couple of small changes. I don't know if I'll ever figure out how to put in a damn zipper. All I have done so far is the hood, gloves (which need some patching repairs) and one bootie. I'm about 19 hours into the project.

Wonder Woman 2.0

I'm still waiting for my fabric to arrive in order to experiment with a new Wonder Woman design I have in mind. I already practiced with a new commercial pattern from New Look using regular cotton. It features built in boning and a side zipper. One of these days I'll get a zipper to actually look right but I'm not holding my breath.


Today after spending about 5 hours cutting out practice fabric for Harley Quinn, the Sherbert Colored version (my practice suit is lime green and salmon), I started making my new Wonder Woman armor.

I used thin plastic sheeting called EZ Quilting Template Plastic which comes in a small roll. Having it already rolled is a bonus in this case because I would have wanted curvature in the pieces anyway. I still haven't gotten the opportunity to get the adhesive metallic mylar; I have plenty of the gold PVC left over from last time so I feel the need to use what's in my overflowing fabric bin. And all I did was scotch tape the fabric to the plastic.

My old tiara is actually a fabric cover of a real metal tiara. This time I made a matching plastic one and tied a piece of elastic to it. I have to paint the stars I have for the tiara and bracers.

Supergirl Hits 5th Avenue

According to all the fashion sources, the designers of Lonstein Gruss have made a deal with WB to launch a Supergirl clothing line for high-end retailers. Forget spunky girlie tees and underwear. This stuff most likely won't cost less than $50 and probably more like $300.

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