Kristin V - Michigan, USA
I chose to
copy Eowyn’s Riding Outfit partly really caught my eye in the interview
clip and partly because I wanted to do something no one else had.
Keeping in mind Cat’s options of perfection, cheapness, and timeliness,
I opted for cheapness and relative quickness. It took me eleven hours
and five dollars to make the outfit.
I’m
horrible with patterns and almost a complete sewing amateur so I
constructed the outfit from secondhand clothes. I got a long khaki
skirt, long-sleeved brown tee, and a brown stretch-velvet dress for
fifty cents each at the local Salvation Army. The skirt had very
non-Middle Earth patches and ruffles so I removed them. I took the
sleeves off the brown tee, and because it was a bit baggy in the waist,
took it in an inch on each side. I also took it up in front about half
an inch. Then I removed the sleeves from the velvet dress.
Unfortunately, the dress’s sleeves were very short so I used the tee’s
sleeves as a pattern to make extensions from the rest of the dress. I
sewed the extensions onto the sleeves, and then sewed the new sleeves to
the brown tee. I made the cowl from the bottom of the dress. It slips
over my head and the stretchiness keeps it in place. The leftover
sleeves I converted into a belt and used a single snap to fasten it.
Just for fun, I used the velvet scraps to trim the skirt’s hem.
The buttons
down the front are real. I bought a package of plain white ones
from Jo-Ann’s Fabrics for a dollar and used three 1 oz. bottles of
metallic gold fabric paint from Wal-Mart to decorate the sleeves, cowl,
belt, shirt’s hem, and buttons. , I simplified the pattern on the hem on the
shirt to a wavy line with a flower in the “valley” and a leaf in the
“hump.” The pattern for the belt was two wavy lines that intersected,
creating circles. I alternated putting stars and snowflakes in the
circles. To simulate Eowyn’s clasp, I painted a triangle over the
snap. The cowl’s pattern was a more complicated version of the shirt’s
hem but the sleeves were my Waterloo. I could not for the life of me
figure out the original . . . and I was running out of paint. I settled
for clusters of three flowers and stems with the occasional leaf
interspersed with curly S’s and dots.
To complete
the outfit, I wore black leather boots and flower earrings. The sword I
got a few years ago from a pawnshop – neither fake nor cheap but it fits
Eowyn’s “warrior woman” personality.