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 joy of embroidery hoops

I have no idea why I never bought myself an embroidery hoop earlier. Working with it is wonderful! This makes me feel even more enthusiastic for future embroidery work. Making the Police Telephone sign has been a lot of fun, especially copying the lovely font of the top half of it. The lower part has a simpler font, without serifs and varying line thicknesses. To my surprise, the simpler font turned out to be the harder one to get to look good. With no frills and details, it's even more important to not have slanted lines that should have been straight and the letters the exact same size.

Still, making the sign has been a joy and I'm really pleased with the results so far.

Next up will be the little sign on the door, the one so many people seem to forget that it even exists. This one:

This will be an interesting challenge too. I'm not sure wether to work in black on white fabric, in white on black or do it with both black and white thread on blue fabric. Those tiny lions and unicorns will be fun to figure out! For those alone, I'm leaning towards white on black rather than the opposite.

Besides embroidery, I have also bought the fabric I'll use for the petticoat that will go with the dress, as well as a few meters of tardis blue satin ribbon, which will go on the sleeves and possibly the collar of the white shirt I'll wear under the dress. But back to the petticoat! Originally, I was thinking white for it. Then I saw this... 

How could I resist? I'm sorely tempted to use part of it to make a small hat veil as well. I imagine it'd look rather nice. It'd be a nice way to hint towards the shiny gold eyes people who interact with the heart of the tardis get. By all logic, the tardis itself if anthropomorphed would have them as well, but the real thing is kinda hard to do without CGI. :)