Erin - Wisconsin, USA

Versatile Elf Costume

A few years ago I needed a white dress to be a living statue for my high school’s madrigal dinner.  My mom made me a dress using the Simplicity design 9891.  It has the neckline of the one on the bottom right, but without the lace-up bodice.  

I’m not sure what cloth is used, but if I’d been there when my mom picked it out, I would have chosen something else – the stuff we ended up with we had to double layer because it was so transparent.  The result was that the costume was a little tighter than it would have been otherwise, and you can see the extra cloth on the bodice where the seam is (it looks like white stripes).  A bit of advice – sometimes quality at a higher price is better than being cheap!  

I made a cloak to go with the dress, and again, I can’t tell you what I used, but it’s very soft on one side, almost like a fleece, with a course weave on the other.  I used the circle style pattern provided on this website.  To pin it, I made my own leaf pin and used a barrette to back it.  

I didn’t much like the belt that came with the Simplicity pattern, so I decided to make my own.  I took two pieces of ribbon and sewed them together at an angle so that they would sit on my hips and not have a bend in the material.  I took another piece, much longer, and sewed it past the midpoint to the angled piece.  When I was done, the front piece fell longer than the back.  I also cut the bottom of these at about a 45 degree angle and hemmed them to prevent fraying.  I bought silver thread and embroidered an elf-like pattern at the top and bottom, and decided to weight the bottom with clear beads.  

For shoes, I got lucky when I went to target.com and found the perfect pair of silver ballet flats.  Last year I had made my own elven shoes using the Beginner's Luck Elven Shoes provided, but since I’m in college now, I don’t have the resources at hand for those, and I ended the day last year with bruised soles.  

Last Halloween, I used this dress to be Galadriel, and my hair was long enough that I could get away with it.  Since then I had cut my hair shorter, and this year I wanted to be Arwen.  Being that I’m not a brunette, decided to buy a wig.  I checked out a bunch of online costume shops and ebay, but ended up buying an actual Arwen wig from a Hallween Express store.  Don’t be fooled by the picture on the cover – the actual wig is much better and worth the $17 I got it for.  The length, the color, the curls; everything is perfect!

Buying this wig also solved another problem for me.  I’d made Arwen’s hair jewel using the instructions on this site, but making my own adjustments to it; I used silver beads instead of white, added different beads to it (tiny clear drops at the bottom of the inner loops) and looped my strands differently.  I’m not a big fan of the flower clips, so I omitted them, figuring that I would simply use bobby pins to pin it under my hair so the ends were invisible.  When I finally had it made, I couldn’t get it to stay because of the weight.  Enter the wig.  The wig cap held the bobby pins perfectly, and it looked wonderful.  

For makeup, I used the Arwen’s Makeup Colors page as a reference and added Mary Kay Velocity powder in Gold for an ethereal shimmer all over.  

I also bought prosthetic ears from Halloween Express, as well as the spirit gum, remover and latex to go with it.  

I was in Spain this past spring break and had to fortune to go to Toledo where jewelry and sword shops are commonplace (a lot of them have the LotR items from the Noble Collection and all of the swords!) and in one I managed to find an official Evenstar for € 55, about $64!  What a steal!  When I tried it on with the rest of my costume, I didn’t like how it competed with the pin, so the pin was dropped and I ended up tying my cloak with silver ribbon.  

Overall, I think this is a satisfactory costume, and you can add different colors to it if you have a white dress with colored belts and cloaks.