This black silk robe a la francaise is about 80% hand-sewn, more than I ever intended. I've retrimmed it 4x now!
Recreating the pink portrait of Mary Queen of Scots had long been a dream, & I finally did it for my birthday.
My drag alter-ego is Leonard Autie, hairdresser to Marie Antoinette. He sometimes gets a new suit for Carnevale.
I had one last-minute “stretch goal” costume for Carnevale 2025 that I managed to finish — I wanted to use the 2 yards of bisexual stripe silk from Silk Baron to make a jacket from the tried-and-true JP Ryan 1750-1780s jackets pattern. I also had some purple taffeta in the stash that coordinated well to
For a Noah’s Ark themed party at Carnevale 2025, I looked around at what costumes I already had that I could use and found Leonard’s leopard-print silk breeches and waistcoat. Perfect base for an 18th-century-ish leopard! I found a faux-fur vest on eBay and carefully chopped it up to make a tail, mitts for front
Remember that 18th-c. Does 17th-c. Masquerade Gown that I was so excited about, but then got almost finished making and hated it? When planning for Carnevale 2025, I came upon a way to resurrect it into something more me that I could love — and get multiple uses out of. The party theme was Cabinet
When I heard there was a Pre-Raphaelite ball at Carnevale 2025, I poured through paintings for inspiration. I love this style and have several pre-raph prints hanging in my house, so there were many to chose from. But being me, I also wanted something dark and gothy, which isn’t as typical of this genre. Then
One last project for 2024 — a new caftan to wear in Cancun! I found this pink bat-print cotton and just had to make it up into a retro ’60s caftan. Easy-peasy project and I definitely want to use the pattern again, especially since I already have several caftans in this exact style, both vintage
It’s been a long time coming, but I finally finished Leonard’s pink suit! I made the pants and waistcoat back in 2023 and commissioned the matching coat around then too. But I never got around to trimming the coat until I was inspired to wear the whole outfit for the Salon at Palais Royal event
Sometime in early to mid 2024, I got a hankering for a new 16th-century outfit. No reason, nowhere to wear it, just wanted one. And not necessarily a fancy one either. I decided to order the Tudor Tailor pattern for a woman’s round gown and see how that made up. Although first, I realized I
One last-minute outfit for Costume College 2024 was very loosely inspired (pun intended) by the 1910s Austrian dress reform designs of Emilie Flöge. These styles were corset-free and intended to give women more liberty and freedom of movement. Flöge had a successful boutique with her unconventional fashion designs, but she’s also known as the muse of
I joined the Barbie train a little late but also because the GBACG announced a Barbie themed event for 2024. And then I decided to get double use out of the costume by finishing it for Costume College for the movie/TV themed Friday night party. Took a while to decide which Barbie to make but
After Carnevale 2024, I was randomly hankering to make something! And I had this gorgeous burgundy liquid metallic velvet in my stash that somehow said “princess gown” like Sleeping Beauty style. Which technically is a mid-15th-century Burgundian style like this Pinterest board and these: Complete with the pointy hennin, of course. But I wasn’t interested
This was my simplest and cheapest costume for Carnevale 2024! For the Pleasure Barge of Cleopatra, I made a Bastet outfit inspired by a Bastet statuette I’ve had forever. She has very tall, pointy ears, so I made those out of some stiff black fabric and interfacing. I bought a silver necklace and matching cuffs
Carevale 2024 was the year of last-minute costumes for me! I normally hate last-minute sewing and try to plan things out so I’m done well before the event or trip. And I was this year! But I also got new ideas about a month before leaving for Venice so… One of the events was “A Night
Sometime around Christmas before Carnevale 2024, I heard about a new costumed meetup, a Toybox Afternoon Tea at the Hotel Danieli. The theme was enchanted childhood and toys, which didn’t interest me at first. But then I was looking through my stash and saw this pink patchwork stuff (I think it was a bedspread?) that
When I heard about a Carnevale dance party with the theme of “Viva las Versailles in Venice,” I immediately thought I needed something shiny and bright. I’d always wanted to do some costume with cute, decorative exposed panniers, so I decided on a showgirl type costume with blinged-up panniers. I looked through AliExpress at rhinestone
I was hosting a small daytime party at Carnevale 2024 — it was a gaming salon with a “fancy loungewear” costume theme. Since I’d be running around as hostess, I needed a simple, practical outfit (but still fabulous ;). Luckily, I already had a custom-made “Carlotta” Spiderweb Robe from Nicoletta Carlone in purple that I’d ordered
