AFWVG - Emily-With-A-Y

I am a horribly neglectful blogger.

The design for Emily-With-A-Y's shift dress to go with the straitjacket. Tattered everything, patches, cogs and (of course) black and white stripes. One thing I forgot to put on the design drawing was the text. The plain side has writing from the book and some copies of a few or the drawings of Leeches and rats.

Not just any insane asylum!" She exclaimed indignantly, as though I had gravely offended her, “Though you certainly do not deserve it. You are a very lucky girl indeed, for you have been assigned a bed in the most progressively innovative, the most morally experimental, the most, ah, the most ingeniously directed medical institution for the mentally ill, led by my own dear son, Doctor Montmorency Stockhill. You are the worthy child, are now an inmate of the Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls.

The cogs on the dress were made in the same way as on the straitjacket, and all the patches/striped parts were sewn on with big red stitches because of that one outfit that EA made.

The sides are pulled in with four fabric straps that are tied at the back. I figured that the Asylum dresses wouldn't be fitted at all, instead being a one-size-fits-all affair. With the straps, it can be pulled in at the waist, giving the dress more shape while still keeping the look of 'it doesn't ft particularly well, really.' I have to thank my tutor for this idea. I was a bit stuck for an idea of how to pull it in, thinking of corset-esque lacing or some buckles like on the straitjacket. We discussed it, and she suggested having straps of the same fabric as the dress instead of more leather, and it was a genius idea.


Then there are the manacles. What kind of asylum inmate doesn't have restraints?

They're just a simple leather wristband with a brass ring popped on there. They're fastened with buckles which, although entirely ineffective for a real mad girl due to the ability to unfasten, they look damn cool like that.



The whole costume, popped on a mannequin, all set up for my degree show. I accidentally managed to find a mannequin that matched the pose of my drawing. It took me a long while to sort the hair out. Stupid small head...

Pyrate

Got myself a new, quick project. I'm (hopefully) going to make this outfit for the next Emilie Autumn gig I go to on April 13th.
Planning on having lyrics from Insects vs. Robots' Fire in the Sky on the sleeve and back of the jacket.

Bring out the fire
What's in your mind?
Do you feel alive?
The sky is on fire tonight 

AFWVG - Plague Rat

FINAL DESIGN



AFWVG - Doctor Stockill

FINAL DESIGN

AFWVG - Plague Mask

The plague mask is an interesting one. It's mentioned just once in the book, I think, in a single paragraph at the bottom of page 206. I could have easily decided to do a generic 'doctor' outfit for Stockill, but since I'm only making the one costume for him, I thought I'd go for something a bit more iconic.

I think the 'plague doctor' is a fairly important aspect to the story since, and here comes a spoiler, Doctor Stockill is trying to create his own strain of the plague so he can create a cure for it, thus getting rich from it when he releases said plague across London. Alongside that, plague masks just look menacing. And menacing is perfect for your average evil doctor.

My first plague mask idea came to me while I was about to fall asleep one night (actually, that's a lie. My first ones came to me when I was in Germany, but those drawings aren't all coloured and pretty. And, quite frankly, they're pretty boring.). The thought was this; one step up from the usual plague mask. I can't help but think that, since he is trying to make the plague, Stockill would be quite aware that it wasn't transmitted by smell. Although, in the book, the mask is described as being stuffed with herbs and things, I thought that I'd industrial it up a bit. Industrial and a bit more high tech - air tanks. Air tanks and filters.

I've played with different shapes of mask (though they are all fairly similar), different types of eyes, different brass fittings... Since I can't cast metal, the interesting bits would have to be very lucky finds or made out of something else and painted. Ideas are sculpey (which I don't think would work too well), Wonderflex (something which I've never used before but read a lot about) and casting things in resin. 

With the eyes, I'm considering going with something styled like eye-cup welding goggles. They just scream 'industrial' and have that same shape as your generic plague mask. I have a couple of pairs with a 'cybergoth' styling to them, which cost me a fair bit of money, so I don't especially want to mess with them. I hunted down a plastic version that I can happily ruin. Probably wouldn't use them, instead using them to make a copy out of Wonderflex or whathaveyou. Going to start working on fake brass bits next week, see what works, and finalise my mask design from there.

AFWVG - More designing

This lovely evening, I am going to share a bunch more designs. At last count, I have 45 which is, for me, a hell of a lot. I usually have about 10 or something. Oh, and then another 19 of back views and such.

Finalising my designs now so I can start making next week, something that I'm sure my tutors will be happy about. With any luck, I'll go to Newcastle and hunt out some leather and brass bits on Wednesday. Shouldn't be too difficult, I've been told about an apparently good shop. More on that if it is.

I am having difficulty, however, sourcing some black and white striped fabric that has stripes of more than 1cm thickness. It's hell, I tell you. Hell. So many of my designs have that on them in some capacity.



ASYLUM GIRLS

Some Ward B girls and a straitjacket. That might be my final design for that, but we shall see. The Ward B girls match the style of my various Emily-with-a-Y designs - same shape 'dress', same types of patches and tears... in fact, they are similar pretty much across the board. The girls differ from Emily, however, because they have ankle cuffs (an indication of being 'more' mad) and collars. I ditched the collar from my Emily design after realising "Oh, this is for a musical. She'll need to sing." Emily would, however, get the ankle cuffs in what could possibly be Act II, or whenever she gets sent down to Ward B herself.

COUNT DE ROTHSBERG

The Count here has, as you can see, the same patches and tears as the Asylum girls in the second design. The first design lacks them, but is otherwise practically the same. This is because he is seen through the eyes of 'Mad' Emily as well as 'Sane' Emily. I'm not sure why, but I have always seen the Count as wearing a red coat. Maybe it's in the book, maybe not. I don't even remember. It's far too late to go reading it right now, so I'm just going to assume it's just in my imagination. That red, however, also serves the purpose of separating him from Stockill (who wears black) and Lymer (who wears white.)

DOCTOR LYMER

Speaking of Lymer, here he is! Same elements from the other costume designs. His coat is white, making him obviously a doctor. It's as simple as that. 

PLAGUE MASK

And oh, here is the fun one. I've never worked with leather before, so this is going to be interesting. Not entirely sure of how it is going to go yet, but I am definitely leaning towards having the pipes to a filter or air tank. I'm going to try and stay away from 'unnecessary' chunks of brass. It always bothers me when I see steampunk things that are just covered in seemingly random brass bits. That, and I don't especially want to learn how to cast metal just yet! I do have a plan, though, for making brass parts, for this and the Plague Rat's claw. More on that later.

Until then, I have a sketchbook to rearrange!

AFWVG - Initial Designs

Back to the fun stuff! I've been working mostly on research, which isn't exactly fascinating stuff to blog about. I did, though, go down to London this week for a trip to the V&A and the Science museum. Some useful stuff there, like so;

A bit miffed that the fashion gallery at the V&A was closed, but oh well. Thinking of going to York, having a look at the museums there.

But anyway, yes. Designs. I've narrowed the characters down to three for my final designs; Doctor Stockill, Emily-with-a-Y and one of the rats. I toyed with the idea of Jolie, Madam Mournington and maybe a chaser, but I stuck with those three in the end, being pretty major characters. I'm trying to keep to EA's general look, but have it not too close so it just becomes copying. 

EMILY-WITH-A-Y

White shift, black and white stockings (of course). Also a straight-jacket because, well, she's mad, isn't she? (and she does wear one for a while in the book, hurrah!)

She's got writing/drawings on her dress because 'little mad doodles'. And her half of the story is all letters and diary things.

The second girl there is Jolie Rouge in the same style.

DOCTOR STOCKILL

Stockill in all of his Punktorian glory. The long coat is 'Plague Doctor' that he wears on page 206. Gonna have it as his general doctoring coat, adding a leather plague mask (oh, fun!) for that bit.

Another version here, this one more 'punk' than 'torian'. Not so fond of it. Well... I like it, but it's not particularly 'Stockill'

RAT

Not sure which rat. Generic rat at the moment. Edward of Basil or someone. Yeah. Person as rat because musical. I have another version of this (not scanned yet) where it has a mechanical arm/leg. Why? Because they got experimented on.

So thar you go. Some initial designs. Going to work on them over the next week since I have no lessons. Curious to see how different they'll end up being.

Ringmaster II

Aaaand here we have the final design for my Ringmaster. Just a little bit of faff with fabrics and I can get started on that jacket.

Ringmaster

My current chunk of work is my minor project for my degree, in which I'm designing and making some costume bits for a little circusy troupe with a theme of playing cards. Who doesn't love playing cards?

First up in the Circus Deck is the Ringmaster, of course. Going with some military junk along with the tailcoat and top hat because, well, card soldiers. It's a common enough idea. And since he's the ringmaster, he's the boss, so he gets extra fancy epaulettes and big-ass cuffs.

That's the design set for Mr. Ringmaster. It's mostly just a change in the jacket, since that's what I'd be making for this project, but it gets a bit more military-y with the design on the front and the shoulder-cord things. It's probably going to get more tweaks before the final-final design, but the third one is the look I'm aiming for.

And the second set, which looks like a super-bling ringmaster. He's based off of the face cards, like the Jack and so on, hence why he's got yellow and zig-zags thrown in there too. I must say, I do love this (especially the second one with the military stuff of the first mixed in), but it's not the look I'm after. It's not dark and grungy at all.