mekyria: (naaigerei)
I am continuing to go through my 'small sewing chores' pile. I bought a white costume in 2008 on bhuz which had two straps going across the belly. To keep everything in place, the previous owner added a gold beaded applique in the center. The applique was in bad shape when I bought the costume because it had no backing.

Removing the applique from the costume was easy as it was practically falling apart. I added white felt to the back and stitched the beads and sequins to the felt, then reattached to the costume. One more chore is done!



I am contemplating my next sewing chore and I feel like doing a full costume. Fromt he top of my head, my options are:

1. I have some lovely blue lycra that Bea send to me two years ago and a contrast lycra that looks fresh and vibrant together. It would be a modern Egyptian style assymetrical design

2.I have a black velvet and purple/lilac mesh pants costume that has been lying in my closet since 2004. It is close to completion but I wouldn't have an occassion to wear it. It doesn't have enough bling for performances and is too showy for regular classes. However, the design is nice and sleek, assymetrical lines and drapes, strass buckles and nice beading.

3. I bought a worn down gold Eman costume with gold metal mesh. I need to make a new skirt/bra base and transfer the metal mesh parts. I am not very excited about this one, as it is a refurbish instead of an original creation. But I can't sell it as is, have worn it twice with a veil to cover up the part where the holographic print is worn away. Sell as is, or refurbish.

4.I bought a whole bunch of small round mirrors with the idea of making a mirror costume, probably on a teal holographic lycra background. You can guess how long the mirrors have been in my possession. This would be a great costume, a bit heavy and prone to damage, but the gluing of the mirrors shouldn't be as time consuming as doing a full blown out beading.

What project would you love to see me do next?
mekyria: (Default)

Our house is startint to look really great! We finished painting the indoors woodwork and I moved on to painting the upstairs radiators and we did the backside of the stairs which was dark brown. Things are white, whiter, whitest.

I will blog soon about my extensive adventures in yoga (spent over 30 hours on it in the last three weeks), after a two year hiatus I started writing again for the dutch belly dance magazine (will be out tomorrow) and I am working through my pile of to-do sewing stuff. I haven't planned moving all my stuff to the new house yet, but my untention is to reduce clutter as much as possible before moving.

I mad this coin bra in 2007 as a part of my old school cabaret costume. Paired with pink chiffon harem pants, a purple satin circleskirt and a purple brocade turkish vest, it was cute as a button. It also was unlined and had the original elastic bra straps because I was pushed for time. You know how these things go, why change something that works? Last year I pneeded a bra underneath my low cut beledi dress, and I noticed that the elastic straps really weren't working any more.

Thus I replaced them with grossgrain ribbon straps and I am now in the proces of adding the lining. 2014 will be a fine year for costuming and I will post more about my costuming adventures on a regular base, both here, on bhuz and on facebook.

Do you have plans for costuming in 2014?

mekyria: (gothic fusion red)
Roos Belinfante posted the pictures and video's of the studentrecital from two weeks ago. It was a SUnday afternoon well-spent, with gorgeous performances and a good atmosphere. If you want to experience some of that good atmosphere yourself, check out Roos's website for her mini summer workshops. If you want to make some good memroies, go to 'Bellydance on the Beach', an event on august 24th in Utrecht with an outdoor  workshop and performances.

For the  student recital I did a spanish-arabic skirt dance to Ya Ghanilek from the cd ' A rough guide to Spanish-Arabic Music'. IT's a really nice song with some intersting variations in the music. I made a choreo for my students during the last semester of classes that I decided to use as a skeleton choreography for my own performance. Mostly improv, with some nice poses thrown in all over the place. Maybe I should make a full blown choreography out of this one and add it to my permanent repertoire.

The costume is my gold/multicolor bella, with an extra double layer pink chiffon skirt on top. I pulled the specially requested streamers with multicolor leafs over the outer skirt for an extra color accent. The layers work well well on stage, the bella skirt is also two layers so there is this big fluffy bunch of chiffon moving around with every spin.


Drama, I HAZ IT!!:
mekyria: (Default)
Some of you might remember that I custom ordered a Bella while I was in istanbul in August. I just received word that the costume is coming my way, shipped from their store in Gent!

Short story: Ozma and I went to see madame Bella, who decided having her 20+ cats in her costume shop was too much. We didn't see the famous cats: instead we went int the appartment and turned right to the show room. Ozma was lucky and found a gorgeous lace costume in moss green and champagne. It only needed shortening of the skirt and she looked like a moss covered goddess rising from the depths of the ocean. Totally hot, awesome costume, as you have seen on her lj/fb. I turned out to be too tall and too big in te hips to fit into off the rack but it didn't stop me from trying all the costumes 

*insert hyperbole and a half reference:*


OMFG it was amazing to be there and try stuff on.

I spotted an amazing costume, mainly warm gold beading and multi color sequins. The bra was a perfect fit, but the skirt with attached belt didn't work for me. I ordered a matching seperate belt, skirt and accesoiries. It has a ton of cut-outs, mesh netting and swarovski crystals. It's also over the top Turkish in the sense that it's one big cut-out. I plan on wearing it for my performance on the 14th of December, maybe also with the live band on October 21th.

Just to share you what type of communication Bella uses in her email, I will copy/paste her full email to me:

subject: re
Hello Kyria,
we will sent your costume from our Belgium Shop soon and we will advice you the tracking no. also
Best regards.
Bella

I have full confidence that I will receive my costume and it will be amazing, but I thought that for a 900 euro costume she could write slightly more elaborate emails to ease my mind. I'm still on my diet of braed and water untill I pay off my debt as it is terribly, horendously expensive. Her costumes are worth it. Hey, I am worth it! I am also very close to my new Eman Zaki costume, Eman is bringing it with her to the Asli Sharqi weekend, which starts right about now. I will post pictures ASAP.
mekyria: (strass stenen)
 Amulya asked about a post to gather all the costume entries for the Pink Turkish costume. It is also an excellent opportunity to show you pictures of the finished costume. I have worn this costume six times since I finished it and it is holding up great. I'm a little bit concerned about the holographic foil print turning silver over time, but so far, so good. I haven't written about making the accessoiries: there is a matching upper arm band and a triangular hand decoration. They were fairly easy: I used a paisley medallion, added to a strip of fabric and edged in beads/sequins. The necklace is my multi-color butterfly necklace that also matches my Pharaonix butterfly. Come to think of it, it matches most of my costumes as it is multi-color. I highly recommend investing in a multi-color jewelry, as it creates an extra bit of visual interest. Rhinestone jewelry just didn't cut it for this costume.

This is a picture of our duet. Hadyr is wearing the Bella I sold her earlier this year, which was the reason why I needed a costume to match it's magnificent blingy-ness. Picture by Merijn van der Vliet:


And here's a close-up from a later show in Bussum. Picture by Michael van Schijndel:


And here is a rather dark video of our duet, taken at a hafla in Wageningen. 

The history:

1 - feb 20th: The materials
2 - feb 21th: belt pattern and base
3 - feb 22th: covering the belt base
4 - feb 24th: rhinestones everywhere
5 - feb 25th: paisley medallions
6 - feb 26th: Vanilla glitter
7 - mar 7th: a whole lot of bling
8 - mar 22th: Fringe!
9 - mar 24th: help me pick a skirt
10 - mar 29th: the bra base
11 - mar 31th: covering the bra
12 - april 7th: beading and fringe on the bra
mekyria: (strass stenen)
 Warning: this post contains images of extreme amounts of rhinestones and may cause temporary blindness due to all the glitter.

In part 4 you could see the progress on the front of the skirt, replacing the old beading with new beading. I'm not extremely pleased with the beading on the front, as I think the middle curl is too small. It would look better if it was bigger, but then again I vowed to myself to finish as many projects as I can in 2011. On January 1th 2012 everything that is left from my fabric stash, sequins, rhinestones, etc, will be given away to people who will make good use of them. My standards of what a finished costume should be have been lowered so I can get away with making more costumes this year. 

Read more... )
The only thing left to do is making gloves/armbands and a headband, edged with gold seed beads. I also wanted to add a waist strap to the skirt, starting at the indentation in the waistband on the left hip, traveling around the waist and back to the waistband. For now I'm going to let the costume rest, as I have a student recital next weekend and my students might need to borrow skirts from me. I have two huge pieces of chiffon like fabric that I want to turn into skirts. To be specific, I've had those two chunks of fabric for over three years now, with the intention of making skirts. It's a good thing I'm making an extra effort to use the stuff in my stash this year!
mekyria: (strass stenen)

It's been a while since I've updated on the green velvet costume, but I assure you that there have been tons of things going on. I finished the bra about one or two eweks ago and posted a close-up on bhuz, but I didn't post it here because I wanted to give you a full update.
Read more... )

More on the back of the skirt tomorrow.
mekyria: (Default)
 I've blogged about the green velvet costume and how it started out with a skirt in 2006. I beaded the skirt in January 2011 and let it rest, as I needed to finish the pink/gold Bella like costume before the start of April. In the back of my head, the green costume was still haunting my dreams. I was halfway already: so close to actually finishing the costume! I prepared a bra base last week and started working on the bra in the past couple of days. The good news: it looks amazing. The bad news: it looks amazing because I used a different beading technique, and I need to redo the skirt.
Read more... )

 

The rhinestone chain was left over from the Bella project. I need more gold beads as I finished my stash:  they are Güttermann beads, high quality and expensive, but worth it. My plan is to finish the bra this week, then let it rest so I can build courage to tackle the skirt.

mekyria: (Default)
 Several anxious dancers asked me on april the third if I had finished the costume on time. I did finish it on time, I put the lining in on Friday. What I might not have mentioned yet is that I was the event organizer for the show, together with the lovely Arya. In addition to organizing the event I was also performing three song in the show: a solo, a duet and a group performance. 

Read more... )
 
mekyria: (Default)
 In my last costume update, you've seen the bra base. In order to make those funky shaped cut-outs keep their shape, I needed to add metal wire to the bra cups. I prefer to cover the bra base first, and stitch the metal wire on later.
read more... )

read more... )


That's all for today, tomorrow I'll post the pictures on the beading and adding the  paisley appliqué's (the same one as the center medallion on the bra).

mekyria: (strass stenen)
 When people commented on the pictures of the belt, one of the most often asked questions was: 'will you do cut-out on the bra too?'. In this post I'll show you how I converted a basic bra into a bra base and made a couple of cut-outs in the bra cup. My lack of posting the past couple of days is because I've been practicing my ass off for the show next Sunday. I can't wear a pretty costume when my dancing is not up to par.

be prepared for LOTS of pictures )

That's it for today, tomorrow I'll post pictures of the process of covering the base with fashion fabric. In case your wondering: this costume needs to be finished for the weekend and my lj posts are behind ont he facts. So rest asure, this costume will be ready on time in all it's shiny glory :)
mekyria: (Default)
 My hands have not been idle in the past weeks. I spent 20 hours on making the beaded fringe for the belt and after that I needed a couple of days to put the belt in my living room so I could stare at it in awe. It's so pretty and sparkly!  It also helps me to keep me motivated, as it will take a lot of hours to make/finish the matching bra. That's what I'm going to work on the next couple of days, stay tuned for more costuming posts. 

you know the drill, here be pictures )




mekyria: (strass stenen)
Other events had me occupied last week so I didn't write much about the costuming project. My hands have not been idle though:  I've spent 13 hours on beading the belt.

Read more... )

I'm currently busy with beading the fringe, another tedious and long winded process. I can bead about 5 cm of fringe per hour and the whole belt is app. 110 cm long. It might be a while before I post the update of the finished fringe. Lucky for me I have tons of movies and series to watch while beading :)
mekyria: (thoughtful)
 No pictures today, but a bit of contemplating about yesterdays poll about chosing colors. And for me a chance to take three of my favorite things and mix them together, the three things being chocolate, glitters and costumes :)

Read more... )

That's all folks, regular costume posts will continue soon.
mekyria: (strass stenen)
 I promised to show the first rhinestones today, but I have to put that on hold for tomorrow's post. Today was filled with working on the preparations of our (meaning Arya and me) first belly dance theater show RonDom Buikdans. Yep, that's the show I'm making this costume for!

Read more... )

See you tomorrow!
mekyria: (strass stenen)
 Covering the belt base seemed like an impossible task. With all the cut-outs, curls and corners, I was not looking forward to the process. Today I'll show you how I covered the swirly part of the design.
Read more... )Covering the complete belt took me 3 hours, but it is very satisfying to see how the project is advancing. Tomorrow I'll post a picture of the whole belt covered in fashion fabric, and the first rhinestones will make an appearance :)
mekyria: (strass stenen)
For a duo performance on April the third, we've been practicing and choreographing a song from Asena's 2005 cd. We didn't decide on costuming yet, but I assumed we'd wear old school Turkish bra and belt sets. I still have my first pro costume, an ancient Bella bra/belt that I bought second hand from my teacher. However, something unexpected happen: I had a Bella costume that didn't fit me, and my fellow dancer fell in love with the costume and bought it from me. 

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Bella costumes: she creates beautiful costumes, using high quality crystals and holographic sequins. Her bead work is amazing, made into almost lattice like curls and shapes. In short, my fellow dancer had a kick-ass modern style Bella costume and asked me if she could wear it for the show. We agreed that she could, but I sort of forgot that I haven't got anything similar in style or bling to match.

That's when I decided I should make a modern Turkish style costume that would look good on stage next to a Bella. To make matters more complicated, I'm on a rather tight budget (that's why buying a costume was not an option). I do have a lot of time on my hands and that is a real advantage in this case! I plan to finish this costume in four weeks, and will update often on the progress and problems I run in. Today part 1: the materials.

Read more... )

That's it for now, more on the belt pattern tomorrow!
mekyria: (naaigerei)
 I recently have time to work on personal projects, and one of those projects is costuming. One of the other projects is trying to reduce the amount of clutter in the house, so instead of starting on a new costume project, I decided to dig deep into the fabric vault and finally get some unfinished stuff done.

Read more... )
mekyria: (Default)
I made a rough selection and narrowed the 6oo+ pictures down to 70 or so. These 5 are the ones that I like most at first glance, I'll have to go through the pile again tomorrow to search for 'second sight gems'. The fun thing about this shoot is that I felt really comfortable with this photographer, which results in pictures that show more then a pretty girl in costume. Not that I don't like to play the part of arabian princess :P Some pictures are useless as promo pics, but I like them anyway
the best thing of all: no photoshopping yet! I might do some little things, but I'm happy with the overall look and feel. My make-up came out better then last shoot, more natural. Also starring the glitter eyeliner of the bodyshop.

bellydance related pictures )

Profile

mekyria: (Default)
mekyria

June 2025

S M T W T F S
1234567
8910 11121314
15161718192021
22232425262728
2930     

Syndicate

RSS Atom

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Jul. 8th, 2025 05:40 am
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios