Costume Report: December 5 – 11, 2023

This feels like a huge oversight to admit to this late in my costuming career, but I have never made a cosplay project for myself! Since I wrapped (mostly) the enormous Captain Hook undertaking, I thought something low-key and low-stakes would be a good idea, so I landed on the idea of making Yor Briar’s sweater dress ensemble from the manga/anime series Spy X Family. 

Yor has a really cool look, and her everyday outfit really translates well to my style of costuming: distinctive accessories, strong visual elements that match how real clothes behave, and they suit real life activities. Her everyday outfit, a red, open-back sweater dress with headband, earrings, bandeau, tights and boots, is also pretty close to my typical outfit in the colder months. 

When planning projects, I really like to focus on them as functional items of clothing. For Yor’s outfit, she requires a lot of freedom of movement, since her physicality plays a large role both as a parent and as an assassin. She’s shown wearing a lot of knitwear, with red and black as important colors in her palette. I definitely looked to this for my choice of materials, looking for something with good stretch and recovery, as well as relatively easy care. Because it is established that Yor is a regular customer at a well-appointed tailor’s shop in a fancy neighborhood, there should be an element of luxury, as well.

Yarn for the dress is KnitPicks Swish Bulky in Serrano. I wanted to keep the budget reasonable, but needed the fiber content to be compatible with wearing next to the body, and I know Swish is a safe option. I went with bulky weight because I wanted a quick gratification project this time, and thought it would support the cosy vibe to the source material. I plan to make some knotted buttons to use as trim, with a slightly lighter color, maybe a leather or cotton cord?

A little while ago, I made a headband for this project, with a remnant of leather and some stashed buttons. I don’t actually have the correct tools for leather working, so I improvised with my tailor’s awl and a heavy needle, but I think it turned out pretty okay! 

Other work this week: Studying my copy of Helen Joseph Armstrong’s Patternmaking for Fashion Design, in anticipation of buckling down to learn Seamly2D.

Mantua Faker? What sort of thing is that, then?

Hello! I’m Lisa, the mantua-faker, and I am glad that you are here. There are two things I am especially good at: making clothes, and terrible word play.

Tl/dr: I like to make clothes, combining historical, vintage and modern styles, materials and techniques.

A “mantua-maker” is equivalent to a the profession of “dress-maker”, “mantua” being an style of gown, circa 1700. In my sewing, I make clothes, typically femme styles. Over the years, I have been involved in theatrical costuming and historical costuming for museum-based educational programming. My sewing training, from my mother and aunts, came through my great-grandmother, a professional dressmaker in the mid 20th century.

All that being said, I have a strong impulsive streak, very little patience, and an eye for coming up with alternative methods to solving problems. If you are here looking for technical perfection, complete historical accuracy, or other normal measures of merit, you are in the wrong place. Hence the “faker” part of the name. I like to think of my work as “historically-informed” rather than “historical costuming”.

Thanks for visiting, and I hope that we will be friends!