Tardis finished!

Wow, I should've made this post ages ago. Anyway, the Tardis costume is mostly finished now.

That's me together with the lovely Cherry from Cherazor's Closet as the 10th Doctor. Do check out her page, she creates some truly awesome stuff. :)

After that shot was taken I finally managed to get a hold of a led lamp to put inside the hat. (Thank you, Ikea and your cheap table decoration lamps!)

Apologies for the atrocious picture quality, it's the only shot I have so far that shows the light well.

The outfit is definately done now, but as always there are still other things that can be done to improve it.

My plans so far are:

• A nice fluffy petticoat to give the skirt some more volume. (I'm seriously considering buying a readymade one, and then add some of the gold tulle I got, it's too soft for me to make an entire petticoat ouf of, unless I buy lots and lots more of it)
• Ribbons in the back so that I can tie it and give it some further definition and shape at the waist. That, or taking it in so that the entire thing becomes a little tighter.
• Blue embroidery on the collar of the shirt. It's hard to see, but the collar of the shirt has a lovely white-on-white embroidered pattern. I figure that it'll look even nicer if it's filled in with blue!

Tardis details: Necklace, windows and a failed hat

 First, I'll get that fail part out of the way. :)

My original idea was to construct a wire frame for the lamp/hat, then cover it with fabric and trim and hopefully in the end put a light inside it. I've learned two things while attempting this: My thin wire is way too thin, the thick one is way too thick. Constructing a cylinder that isn't all wonky out of these two is near impossible.

Time to rethink! Spotting an old soap jar from Lush gave me an idea. I'll use that as a base and glue the fabric and trim onto it.

This will have several advantages. Firstly, it will be sturdy and keep its shape even if I accidentally sit on it or something. The wire one would have needed handling with extreme care not to bend out of shape. Secondly, with large flat surfaces it will be much easier to attach the trim to it neatly. Thirdly, if I handle this well, I'll be able to attach the lid to the headband in a way that allows you to unscrew the jar itself. This will prove very useful once I get to the point of attaching a light inside it, allowing me to turn it on and off as well as change batteries without having to deconstruct the entire thing. All in all, I think this is a big improvement.

I've also done some work on the dress itself.

Those two aren't finnish flags, but the future windows of the tardis. Due to their proportions, I opted for 2x2 windows instead of the correct 3x2. I'm fairly confident it will look good anyway. Next up is attaching them, but I'm not quite sure what the least complicated way to pin them on will be, seeing how the top front part of the dress isn't a flat piece and making them line up nicely is really important since it'll be extremely obvious if they're crooked. Since I don't own a mannequin, I think I'll have to try to pin them on while wearing it. I hope I don't get too many bloodstains on it as I stab myself repeatedly! XD

Lastly, there's the necklace!

The embroidery isn't anywhere near as neat as the embroidery on the sign is, but it's done in sewing thread and working on the small ribbon was rather fiddly. If it bothers me enough, I might take it out and redo it at some point in the future. Right now, I'm happy with it. The key is too small to be a proper tardis key, it's the spare for a padlock I found lying around. The shape is good enough though, and it's a good size for the necklace, so I'm happy. :)

The Doctor is taking shape

In fact, he's nearly finished!

All he needs to be considered finished now is his shoes, though I'm considering adding his glasses as well.

The doll isn't the only progress I've made either. I've also started on the Tardis project.

I'm basing the pattern for the dress on a medieval one for making fitted dresses such as cotehardies. To be honest, the primary reason I'm using this is that I own it, rather than any kind of superiority in style and shape for this particular dress. But I think it will work out well. The plan is fitted but not overly tight, a knee length skirt that flares out a bit more than the original pattern, which will later on be improved on by a nice petticoat.

Right now, however, it fits more into the "shapeless sack" category. It turned out a bit larger than intended, and I'll need som aid in pinning it so I can change the seams to make it fit better. I also need to figure out wether I can get my hands on a nice blue zipper, or if I should just go for a black one and hope to hide it. Nevertheless, progress has been made! Next up after fitting it properly will be to measure out the size for the windows and panels and start figuring out how I will construct those.

The Doctor doll

I decided that a funny detail to have with the tardis outfit would be a Doctor doll or two to store in my pockets. Since I'm not quite up to starting on the dress yet, I went and bought some skin coloured felt to get started on the doll. Since the 10th Doctor is my favourite, and I happened to have scraps of brown fabric lying around, I decided that a tenth in his brown suit will be the first doll. Not sure yet if I'll attempt the trenchcoat too, we'll see.

Since I wanted to sit sewing in front of the tv, I opted to do all seams by hand. I prefer that anyway when working with something so small.

As soon as I started sewing I realised some minor problems. I hadn't been careful enough when cutting the pieces, and he ended up a bit lopsided. Second problem was the realisation that this felt was rather thin and low quality compared to what I remember working with as a child (last time I made a doll like this), and it ripped and stretched in several places. I managed to stitch the rips back together, but he ended up looking even more warped. It also didn't help that I left the head for last opening for stuffing, rather than a sensible place like his stomach, so the head ended up even more stretched and warped. In short, he looked like a mess.

I decided to sew the shirt and pants onto his body. Both because it will be much easier than making a removable garment, and because it should help prevent the felt from ripping further. The shirt is made of pieces from an old bedsheet. All seems beside the one running along the sleeves is sewn into the doll, leaving the ends of the sleeves loose and giving the illusion of a removable shirt.

Next comes the pants, attached to him in the same way as the shirt, with the bottom hem of the pants the one exception. These are a bit tight though, and may as well have been completely sewn on.

The jacket is the one removable garment he will wear. So far, I've made the main body and sleeves. Next up will be detailing such as pocket flaps and lapels.

I have yet to decide what to make the hair out of. One option is to make a sort of wig out of brown fabric, another to make it out of brown yarn. I'm not sure what will look best, nor if either of them would allow styling it into something resembling his hairstyle. The face will definately be embroidered on, but I don't know if it will be with or whitout glasses.

The shoes are also likely to be a tricky part, I shall have to dig through my fabric chest and see if I find any inspiration there.