This dress didn't immediately call to me. Kaylee's layered cake overpowered the elegance of Inara so I had to do Kaylee's first. Since I have finished it, with the exception of one silly little hook and eye, it was time to move on. I was debating this one and Banning Miller's dress. What can I say? I love hoops! This one won out because I found the fabrics first. So, here is the goal.
The first thing was to find the fabrics. I found this lovely piece of brocade on Devon St. in Chicago during the summer of 2005.
I was looking mostly for a piece of gold brocade to make Inara's black and gold outfit from Serenity but this was a very close second. Found this but not the gold. I then had to find a silk to match it for the bodice. As it turns out, this is a very hard fabric to match. I searched everywhere around Cedar Rapids, went up to Minneapolis, and I think I went to Chicago twice. I finally did find it in a remnants pile so not only did I find a fabric that matched perfectly, but I got it at a great discount. =)
I figured out how I wanted to bead it and bought the beads and cut out the skirt. It stayed like that for over a year before I got back to it. I was hoping to get it done for DragonCon 2005 but figured out pretty quickly that it wouldn't happen and put it away. During that year, the designer of Firefly, Shawna Trpcic, put the original dress up for auction. Since I'm somewhat poor and was looking forward to the challenge of making it myself, I passed on the opportunity to purchase the real deal and settled with the wonderful pictures.
I hadn't realized that the hem was embroidered. Well, now mine certainly has to be embroidered. So I figured out the design and got to it. I couldn't match the colors exactly and decided I really like the way these look with it. I knew it would take quite awhile and I only had six weeks before the Browncoat Ball 2006, so I didn't embroider all the way around and didn't embroider the full design. But everyone at work swears they can't tell it isn't done so I'm going with it for now.
The beading was another tricky thing. I didn't have near enough time to do the beading as I wanted but it needed sparkle. Okay, I had the beads and I love sparkle so it needed sparkle. =) I didn't get as far as I wanted but I didn't have any more time so went with it. The crystals don't photo at all but they look great in person.
The bodice I tried to finish as much as possible. Tearing that thing apart again to bead did not sound like fun so I finished the beading on the main part of the brocade and put it together. The pearls around the neckline and around the border are handsewn on and, like normal, it took much longer than I thought it would. So I was stitching them on the day of the ball and didn't finish them the way I wanted to either. One string of pearls didn't have big enough holes so I have to get more and restitch about eight inches but it isn't noticeable when worn.
The tiaras are the closest that I could find in the limited time I had. There is a ton in silver but gold is much harder to find apparently. The jewelry was a lucky find on eBay. I found a great set...well, actually I bought two that were close and inexpensive and then found this one right after that cost a bit more but still quite inexpensive. The bracelet is made from the tikka and part of the earrings.
This is the dress that made it's premiere at the Browncoat Ball in San Francisco. I am mostly happy with it but the fit does need to be tweaked. I had measurements from over a year ago and only did one fitting, once again from over a year ago. So, considering that, the fit isn't all that bad. I would still like to tweak it though.
The hem needs to be finished - the rest of the embroidery, beading, and border. The bodice needs to have beads in the border part. I also need to resteam the bodice since all of the folds washed out. I would like to tweak the necklace and bracelet a bit more as well. Maybe it will be completely done for Comic Con 2007, I just wouldn't count on it. =)
UPDATE:
I have now worn the dress three times this year. I wore it to ComicCon this past July on my birthday, every lady should feel like a princess on her birthday and what says princess better than lots of sparkle and a tiara? =) Then I wore it the following week to Costume College and also four weeks later at Dragon*Con.
The skirt hem was torn apart and two more motifs were embroidered and more beads were added before I ran out of time once again. Other than that, nothing has changed. The fit is rather big on me due to me losing a bit of weight so if I were to wear it again, a new bodice would be needed. I did find new fabric for the top so it is in the plans but since I have worn this costume three times now, my efforts are going to new projects for the next year at the very least.
Dragon*Con also left nice lovely black marks all over the hem. Imagine how thrilled I was about that one. A good wash and scrub - a very careful scrub where the embroidery is - and it's not at all noticeable anymore unless you know where to look and look closely. The hem guard is completely trashed though. It was never completely finished because I quickly threw it on for the Browncoat Ball and again for ComicCon so serging was quite visible on the inside. The very pretty sequined shoes that I have for the costume caught the serging like you wouldn't believe and tore the serging all up, caught me up when walking, and left little trails of ivory thread. So between the trashed serging and the black marks, I wasn't putting any effort into making that work again. Thankfully I had found a great stretch satin to make lovely gloves to replace the somewhat chintzy ones I have and bought enough to redo the hem. So, I don't even care that the guard was completely trashed since it was going to be replaced before being worn again. =)
The only other not so happy thing that I found out while wearing this was that the bracelet really isn't that sturdy. It broke at least once at each event. Thankfully it's just one weak jumpring so it's easily replaced with a better quality one so hopefully it won't be breaking next time. I also apparently hadn't put a clasp on it for the Browncoat Ball but I added one after ComicCon. It was tied on for ComicCon and I had to keep begging Bryan to retie the chain. It works much better now.
Of course, at each event, I was much more interested in getting pics of everyone else rather than of myself so we only have pics from ComicCon. It was great fun to wear this costume and hopefully I will get back to it someday and actually finish it up properly.
Events:
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