I called this costume ''NO damsel in 'DIS' dress!
INSPIRATION
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Fairytales portrait 'fluffy' old fashioned beliefs.Some women still get rapped by the ideal fairytale, where being rescued by a prince on a prince on a white horse is the only happy ending. However,not every women wants to be a damsel in distress.Many prefer to rebel, leaving their castle walls and rescuing themselves.
A new fairytale....
Once upon a time there was a woman. She was not a princess and she did not want to be one. She had fallen asleep for a hundred years.More than one prince had tried to wake her with a kiss and take her away on their white horse, but the woman never woke.
Maybe the woman did not want to wake.Maybe the woman did not want to be rescued.Maybe the woman did not want to kiss a prince.Maybe the woman was gay. Maybe the woman did not want to be taken away on a horse to a place beyond her control and get married to a prince.Maybe she didnt believe in princes being heroes.Maybe she had a dream of her own in those hundred years of sleep.
So she decided to wake one day and found herself in a world where everyone was the same and society was dominated by a unidirectional,premade plan for every woman's life.Tha day she decided to just be herself.She decided to be her own white horse and rescue herself.
She broke from her walls of imprisonment and stood up against societies expectations which were stubborn and at times refusing to move ahead, even backtracking a little. Just like the horse she had to carry around with her forever from this day. The ever remaining imprint of the scarlet letter.She carried it...and she carried it with pride, because at least her story was real.
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MATERIALS used...
I'm very dedicated to recycling.So my costumes always have a large focus in this area.
I'm proud to say that this costume uses mainly recycled materials.
Examples of what I used and how are as follows.....
This garment was made using 3 vintage wedding dresses,one of which was my own wedding dress.
I recycled ,
vinyl handbags
christmas decorations
potato mashers
pieces of wood
chains
screw eyes
buttons
childs dress up bobby hat
pillow
halloween costume wig
dacron stuffing
mans suit jacket
mans vinyl motorcycle pants
50's womens skirt
faux fur
horse bit
velvet from bridesmaid dress
Methods i used included, sewing, wood carving, distressing, moulding vinyl, gluing and manipulating fabrics. Some felting.Boning.
This is a close up of the dress front to show you the felted skirt fabric used to simualte castle stone work ..sort of. The portculis is made from strips of a mans motorcycle trousers,and the chains were from a plumbing store, and the only new thing used!
I wanted to have a drawbridge to look like a way in to this woman's heart, but also show it as armour, like a cage as such..entrapment.
The riding hat was made by cutting off the brim on a childs english bobby hat.From here I manipulated and moulded vinyl from a handbag around it.Then sewed on handbag straps from 5 different bags to simulate reins.
The horse bit was meant to be higher up..the hat also fits better.This model just had a smaller head, possibly due to the bald head!!
I had hoped to use real horse hair in this costume, but as this was a last minute entry..( I struggled with the suggestion that I use a real horse skin from an abbatoir..being a vegetarian) I used faux fur to show the fluffy unreal part of fairytales we cling to. I made it into a cross between a horse main and a mowhawk..showing some defiance, being a bit of a fighter against tradition and I guess abit of an anarchist in some peoples eyes.
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