Amanda's Examples

(Lasgalen) Ohio, USA

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Legolas

For the outer tunic, I used Butterick 3249, and modified the heck out of it to get the skirt. I lucked into green and brown, 100% polyester “suede-like” cloth on the discount table. After staring unblinkingly at the real Legolas costume at the Toronto exhibit, my friends and I conclusively decided that the yoke is brown, no trace of green, so that’s what I used. Detailing on the tunic was done with thinned silver fabric paint. I handstitched the yoke down to the tunic, which made the brown suede portion lay much neater. Very time consuming but worth it I did the “petal” shaped sleeves with the brown covers. I grommeted the sides of the tunic so I could lace them up. One thing I would do differently in retrospect would be to use hook tape on the front of the tunic as they did in the movie. I made the mistake of just stitching up the front, figuring I could pull it over my head. Now I know how difficult that is to do when you are wearing elf ears and desperately trying not to mess up your perfectly coiffed elf ‘do.

For the silver undershirt, I also used Butterick 3249, unmodified. Unfortunately, I used ice blue (should have been silver) lining. Ooops. I’m a beginner, and I liked the color. Version 2.0 will be silver dupioni.

My cloak was McCall’s 8937. I decreased the size of the hood so it wouldn’t interfere with my knives and quiver.

I constructed my Lothlorien quiver using 7-8oz. veggie tanned leather. Before hacking into my leather I made a “mold” out of cardboard and duct tape, and fitted cheapo vinyl around it to get a template. Using my template, I cut the sized piece from the hide and dyed it using Fiebrings Leather Dye. I then took my peacock design that I had drawn onto tracing paper and tooled it into the wet leather using a stylus. The leather was then tied onto the mold while it was still wet and left to dry for 24 hours. I did all the trimming, hole punching, and painting (Cova Color paints) while the quiver was still on the mold. Then I sewed up the back and the bottom with leather strips.

My bracers were made essentially the same way as my quiver. My mini-stroke of genius was to take them to a shoe repair store and have boot lace hooks set into them, much cheaper then buying the gear to do it yourself. The patterns I used for both the quiver and the bracers can be found in the Photo Album in my folder, Las’s Costumes.

I made 8 arrows for my quiver since I can’t afford the good wooden ones. Bought fletching stuff at Gander Mountain (Insta-Fletch, bonds fingers to arrows in seconds!!), used dowel rods and stain from Home Depot. Wrapped the top with embroidery floss to make it look nice. Each arrow took about an hour total to make (cutting, staining, fletching), and it probably cost $20 or so to make all of them. Untipped to be Ren Faire friendly.

My knives originally had steel blades that I cut with a saber saw, but I removed the blades so they too would be Ren Faire friendly. Now craft sponges (very intimidating to Orcs) are attached to a bit of the tang that sticks out. The handles are just pieces of wood from the garage, cut, sanded, and painted.

Assorted Purchased Items

Woochie brand Small Space Ears, ~$10 – from cinemasecrets.com, great company to work with, my ears got damaged in the mail and they quickly sent free replacements. Don’t forget spirit gum, and REALLY don’t forget spirit gum remover.

Noble Collection Leaf Brooch, ~$bazillion dollars – gorgeous, but my friends and I made perfectly good ones with Sculpey, some wire, and a bit of paint for a fraction of the price.

Long Bow, ~$50, bought through E-bay. Sanded the finish off and painted it a translucent white. Maybe I learn to be a bowyer for my next project.

More costumes on Amada's website: www.geocities.com/cuprysa/index.html

This page was last updated 11/21/09