Kyria's journal

 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

 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.
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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).

 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 )

 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 :)

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That's all folks, regular costume posts will continue soon.

 I promised to give you guys a peek of the belt with the rhinestones, and here we go.
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An update on the resources: the sequins arrived in Tuesday and the beads arrived today. Those hot pink beads? They are not matching the sequins and fabric. Lucky for me, the supposedly purple beads are a perfect match, so I'm going to use those. I also realized that I needed more gold bugle beads and purple bugle beads then I expected, if I want to make the fringe too. I ordered those today but expect that it will take another 5 days before they arrive. 

Tomorrows post is all about the paisley front closure that isn't pictured in the above update.  

 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.
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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 :)

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.

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That's it for now, more on the belt pattern tomorrow!

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 )

I'm halfway through this project. It really isn't that much work, but it's important that it fits well, so it's taking longer then expected.

( mock-up and haflway through pictures )

The idea of this costume came to me when I was digging through the piles of fabric that I have in my fabric stash. About 6 years ago I bought heavy, luxurious black stretch velvet and started making a catsuit out of it, but never finished it. The catsuit is still almost done, so I'm going to use the bottom part as pants for this costume. I also bought purple/pink/black iridiscent fabric two years ago, because it's so shiny and I wanted it. the rhinestone chain came into view when I vistited a local craft store who sells expensive sewing stuff. I decided to go for the minimalistic look, mainly because the fabric is so lush. The rhinestones really stand out (there is a strand in the draped part too, but it don't show well in the picture). The bra is almost finished by now.

( meow! )

Working on this one got me some more ideas in my head. The bra is progressing faster then I expected, when I made the drawing I expected that it would take much longer. This cossie needs a sleek choreo with a lot of fast, snakelike move, leaning towards modern dance, or something with arabic pop.

( the rest of the costume )