No, this is not a period Elizabethan costume.
Yes, I most definitely fell in love with it.

Even if Queen Jamillia was only visible for a very short time in Star Wars, Episode II, she most definitely made a great impression on me. I just love her slightly arrogant and snarling look.
The costume is also a plus because *if* I go to costume meetings I prefer some kind of makeup which makes it practically impossible for other people to recognize my real life face
Even more a plus: I think Jamillia, and please don’t laugh, looks a bit like a stylized art deco sunflower with her headdress. I like sunflowers, so…
And she is slightly overweight (or at least seems so with her rounded face), and I am currently also overweight. That was most definitely the last plus I needed to finally decide that I wanted this gown – as in “very much and right now”.

Think about it:
A snarling, arrogant, overweight and stylized black and white sunflower
- I mean, who on earth could resist something like that?
(Yes, I’m totally nuts.)

Let’s analyze the costume. It consists of several parts:

The white (or light cream, rather) underdress – which, by the way, would be called a “kirtle” in Elizabethan terms – is made of short-piled velvet; decorated with embroideries in cream and a slightly glittering black thread;

The overdress is made of crushed black taffeta;

The front middle piece is made of black netting fabric which has circle-shaped sequins all over it, and then was beaded with cut jet beads;

The collar is made of black velvet, edged with embroidered white/cream velvet;

and the headdress seems to be made of wood or horn combined with mother of pearl slices plus an elaborate arrangement of Jamillia’s (own?) hair on the backside.

At first looking simple, the costume is a very demanding task to reproduce.
That task sounds funny and impossible? Well… let’s see.

This costume diary starts with the Planning. Navigation for this part
of the page:

• Queen Jamillia, StarWars
• Planning
• Beading the front piece
• Overdress, sleeves & collar
• Embroidered underdress
• Finished costume

Star Wars Episode 2 – Naboo’s Queen Jamillia

Some observations and thoughts on the original gown considering the task at hand – I have written them down over a considerable amount of time, so some of the information may seem doubled, but actually they all contain some new information.
I always do this sort of brainstorming before I start working on a gown while I just stare at various pictures and, if given the chance that it’s a movie costume, I watch the scene several times and write down notes over a time span of several days or even weeks, the time depending on me being satisfied with my musings.

Such a brainstorming would read like this:

• The white ‘underdress’ – or kirtle – goes up far over the waist, can therefore not simply be substituted with an Elizabethan petticoat. My first thought was to make a petticoat plus bodice, but that wouldn’t work. Therefore, I’ve decided to make a kirtle; which makes sense – after all, the complete look of the costume strongly resembles an Elizabethan loose gown plus kirtle.
• The sleeves of the black overdress of the Jamillia gown are so *not* period Elizabethan. Though at first sight they look like a crossover between hanging and Spanish sleeves, closer examination shows that they have a completely different shape. Also, it seems as if the sleeves and the black overdress are separate pieces – the sleeves seem to be connected, and are worn like a shrug over the black overdress.
• The hanging, beaded, center front piece could be connected to the large, non-period black velvet collar.
• …so could the sleeves. In theory, at least.
• The back of the overdress looks much like a kirtle or loose gown with a gore at the complete center back, starting from about mid-back (the gore, that is). Unfortunately there only seems to be ONE picture available that shows the gown from the backside.
  
• The outer shape of the whole gown, if I leave off the collar, middle piece and sleeves in my mind, much resembles two gowns described in Janet Arnold’s “Patterns of Fashion – The cut and construction of clothes for men and women c. 1560-1620″:
  namely the kirtle and the loose gown from the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, 1570/90 on pages 109 – 112 (this combination is also to be seen on the left side of the cover of this PoF book).
  Compare (I have flipped the illustration from PoF here to make it better comparable to Jamillia’s gown):
  
  Looks quite similar, doesn’t it?
  I think I should use those two gowns as basic patterns for the under- and overdress, then construct a separate, detachable collar with the ‘Jamillia’ sleeves.
• To determine the exact size of hoopskirt I need, I just need to apply basic math knowledge about how to calculate circles (and, yes, thank you – I know why I paid attention in my maths class):
  Assuming Jamillia is as tall as I am, which would be 178cm with shoes – then I can say by looking at the picture that shows the complete Jamillia that her skirt is about 1/2.5 of that size wide; which would be about 71.2cm.
  By multiplying this with Pi (3,14159265358979) I can now calculate that the hem circumference of her skirt must be about 224cm. The closest size of a finished bridal hoopskirt to that (because I don’t want to construct an own hoopskirt for that gown – *sometimes*, buying is easier!) is 220cm – this is why I have decided for that size.
• To construct the skirt of the kirtle, which lies quite flat over the hoopskirt, I think I would be safe by making the skirt bottom circumference 10 cm wider than the hoop circumference is – meaning that it will have to be about 230cm wide.
• (Note: This part is something I’ve had to revise. There are no diamond shapes on the front piece. You can clearly see it in larger exhibit pictures at Padawansguide. I’ve also revised this planning when I beaded my triangular piece; but just for the sake of having the brainstorming complete, I’ll leave my initial thoughts here.)
  I think (though I may be wrong) that the front middle piece is basically beaded with black and dark golden sequins (which would make it easy for me – I’d just go and buy a yard or so of sequined fabric and use that as the basic material), and over those black sequins they have pinned diamond shapes made of black jet cut pearls. These diamond shapes are bigger at the top and smaller at the bottom; plus they overlap at the top. Here’s what I mean:
  
  Left = unedited version; right = marked version.
  The red diamonds, in my opinion, mark the diamond shapes of pearls, overlapping at the top, at the bottom they are smaller. They also have either a rhinestone or clear crystal pearl in their centers.
  The blue circle at the top marks the top shape which seems to be round (plus has something likely to a wing- or heart symbol in silver beads in it).
  The green arrows mark the loose strands hanging down from the top piece.
  Well, that’s at least what I *think* I can see here. The diamond shapes should be simple to construct with wire and pearls, but it will probably be quite time consuming… well… as I have no particular date to which I would like to wear that gown, I can take myself time…
• After enlarging the kirtle pattern I came to a skirt circumference for the original kirtle in my size of c. 260cm – quite close to what I first calculated; 40cm are not much when it comes to the circumference of a skirt hem….
  However, now I know that I have to look for a 250-cm-hoopskirt instead of a 220-cm-one.
  I should also look out for one that has at least three stable hoops. If I indeed should make the loose gown turn-able with a velvet in- or outside (depending on which side I’m wearing out…), then there will be a considerable amount of weight on the hoops. To avoid them starting to “escape” through the front gap of the loose gown, I’d better choose some strong ones that will carry the weight without ‘complaining’….
  (and here, too, a revision of my initial thoughts took place in the end. I’ve used the farthingale of my Pelican gown for this dress; which happens to have just the right size )
• I have to find a solution for the mother of pearl elements of the headpiece.
  Mother of pearl elements are so expensive that I could cry, and I have not seen *one* yet that *has* the size of just one of the original elements.
  It took me from 2005 to the end of 2011 to actually come up with a useable idea for that substitute, by the way. Google “Drum Wrap”; or look at my Drum Wrap tutorial
• Pattern wise, there is some kind of ‘giant forepart’ on the kirtle from Patterns of Fashion.
  Well, it’s of course not a real forepart, but a piece of “soft ivory silk with fine silver threads in the weft (…), embroidered with couched black silk thread resembling buttonhole twist and 3mm (1/8) spangles in bluish grey metal”¹, sewn to the front portion of the gown. This is the part of the kirtle that would show below the loose gown.

Planning finished:

After the above written brainstorming, I came to this finished plan:

• Construction of a kirtle and loose gown from the above mentioned “Patterns of Fashion” patterns.
• Sleeves will be made as a “shrug” to be worn over the loose gown.
• The underdress will be made from the PoF-kirtle-pattern. I will make it of the white jacquard I still have. If I should still have the nerve to do so, I will embroider the center front and the trims on sleeves and collar (which have to be embroidered on short-piled cotton velvet, like the original!) in a likely way to how Jamillia’s gown is decorated.
  Jamillia wears narrow crushed taffeta sleeves under the wider ones:
  
  So I will make a pair in crushed taffeta, the other of more period “Elizabethan” material. I can exchange them by the lacings which are also on the original gown, in case I ever want to wear the kirtle with a more period loose gown.
  I am not certain yet about the “full gown forepart” described in the brainstorming – I guess I will see what I make here during the making process.
• For the gown I will use my ‘Pelican’ gown farthingale. Yes, it’s red, but that’s just decadence
• The collar, ‘Jamillia’ sleeves and the ‘Jamillia’ front middle pieces will be made as single pieces.
• The Jamillia headdress will be made… somehow. I honestly don’t have many ideas yet how to make it, but I will. Thanks to the person who has invented Fimo, I will also complete that particular task, I guess

After this planning stage is finished, I can now construct the kirtle as soon as I find time to do so and have the nerve *sigh*….

After the latest exhibit pictures it became clear that the white underskirt is not decorated with lace, as I had thought, but that it is indeed embroidered.
Not that I would want to do that… really, no… however, just to keep myself entertained, I have programmed the embroidery from the exhibit swatch pictures.
In the embroidery software, the preview looks like this:

I think it’s a quite close match.
And as I’m currently in an awfully good mood – you can download the zipped embroidery file here.
You’ll need a Brother embroidery machine to use that file, though; or any other high end embroidery machine and/or software that can convert a *.pes file. The file is made for the larger embroidery hoop – 18x13cm (about 7×5 inch). If you don’t have that larger hoop, you’ll have to resize the embroidery with your software; but be aware that this CAN lead to undesirable results (just like upsizing it, by the way).
The skirt itself has variations of that swatch pattern.

Since much of the embroidery is covered by the black, triangular beaded piece and by the overdress, I had to basically “piece” the embroidery together from various exhibit photos (because some that were taken from certain angles show parts of the embroidery which are hidden by the overdress and / or the triangular piece when seen from the front).

Here’s what my pieced-up collage of the embroideries looks like. Note that the images, if you click them to see the full size, are HUGE – they’re basically lifesize:

Center front, complete – red line indicates the center; note that I only pieced up HALF of the embroideries (left side) because the other side is symmetrically mirrored:

Front side (left side, to be precise) turned straight – again, the red line indicates the center front (which, since I turned the embroideries, is at an angle)

Bottom center front:

And here’s the preview of the embroideries that I’ve digitized from that collage. Again, the images are huge, but not as large as the ones above. Red lines indicate a) the center front and b), in some cases, where I have to change the hoop for the embroideries (remember, those are MACHINE embroideries!). Of course you’re free to compare those previews to the original, pieced collages above; and, in case you find apparently huge mistakes, I hope you’ll point them out to me.

Front side:

Center front:

Also, I have digitized the embroidered sleeves trim as well.
I’ve digitized a repeat of 26cm (about 10 inches), which fits into the hoop four times. The space between the trim strips is just so that I have a selvage (and the red lines indicate where I can cut it). I’ll embroider this on the bias of the fabric, so I have the possibility to slightly curve the trim where I need to when it’s done:

Of course I’ve also digitized the collar. That was, in my opinion, the hardest part to digitize, since the pictures don’t show the top of the collar; so that’s where I had to guess the embroidery.
The preview pic is probably a bit confusing. The back of the collar is on the left side, the center front is towards the right. The red lines indicate the outline of the collar trim; the one long red line is indicating the grain of the fabric. There are also tiny notches in the red outline, those indicate matching notches on the black velvet (to which I have to attach the white velvet collar trim); as well as some lines which indicate the brooch placement at the center front. I don’t need the latter to attach the brooch, I needed those lines when I digitized the embroideries from photos.

And just for the statistics, as usual… here’s the raw embroidery data, which I got from my embroidery software’s statistics (I use Brother’s PE-Design 6, by the way, to digitize my embroideries; and the machine that I can use can take frames up to 10×6 (16x26cm)) for the single embroidery files.

Embroidery piece	Stitches	Has to be embroidered…	Results in … stitches
Front side	222,956	twice (x2) – left and right side	445,912
Center front	44,587	once (1x)	44,587
Trim for sleeves	44,039	four times (since each frame gives me a bit more than a yard of trim to work with, and each sleeve will take approximately 2 yards)	176,156
Trim for collar	40,210	twice (2x) – left and right side	80,420
Result			747,075 (Yes, that’s almost eight hundred thousand stitches!)
Also, just for the statistics:It took me about 14 days to digitize all these embroideries. I will have to change the position of the fabric on the hoop (20x for sides + 2x for center front + 4x for trim + 10x for collar (the latter is just a rough estimate!)) = 36 times. That’s 36 times for things to go awfully wrong Also, in case you have no idea about the time frame: Each frame takes approximately an hour to to 90 minutes to embroider; but I can’t concentrate on watching the embroidery for more than 2 frames per day (just because it’s something you have to concentrate on HARD, to catch the machine in case the thread breaks, or the lower bobbin is empty, or the needle breaks, or, or, or. You just have to sit and WATCH that thing – which makes as much noise as a starting jet! – and do nothing else!). That basically means that IF I embroider two frames per day, it will STILL take me more than TWO WEEKS to finish the entire embroidery, IF I don’t take a single day of break. And that’s JUST the embroidery; no sewing done yet!

Besides the white velvet (~2.5 meters, 150cm // 60 inch wide) and the embroidery threads, by the way, this particular embroidery project will also “swallow” approximately 3 meters of 1 meter wide sticky interfacing (which I need to be able to exactly position the fabric on the hoop when changing it) and the same amount of clear, water-soluble “topping” (which has to be put OVER the velvet while embroidering it, so it basically crushes the velvet pile down beneath the embroidery).
Concerning embroidery threads, which are a HUGE factor in this project:
My calculations, done with an embroidery digitizing software which is able to estimate thread usage, I calculated that I will need approximately 5,500 yards of white / cream thread and approximately 2,750 yards of black metallic thread, which, by the way, is most likely to have been Madeira’s “Super Twist 30″ in “Black Pearl”, color #264 on the original gown, plus approximately 7,000 yards of bobbinfill thread).
Plus, because metallic thread tends to wear needles out faster than other thread, I think I will need two packages of Schmetz TopStitch needles (there are five needles in each package).
Just the threads and needles alone are worth approximately $110, if bought on large bulk spools!

Just good that it takes some time to have those bulk spools and needles delivered to me; so the first actual thing I did on the Jamillia gown is to bead the triangular front piece; so that’s how this dress diary continues

¹: from Janet Arnold’s “Patterns of Fashion c. 1560-1620″, page 110 Navigation for this part
of the page:

• Queen Jamillia, StarWars
• Planning
• Beading the front piece
• Overdress, sleeves & collar
• Embroidered underdress
• Finished costume

Queen Jamillia:
The beaded front piece of a Naboo Queen

For the triangular, hanging front piece I bought 10 inches (25cm) of 60 inches (150cm) wide sequin fabric.

Since that fabric was pretty flimsy and thin, I flat lined it with a layer of velvet, just to give it more stability.

Then I started using beads and nylon thread to imitate the ’8′ shaped beading of the original front piece.

Yes, well, the beading is pretty hard to see in this picture (at least on the sequin fabric – you can see the ’8′ shapes very well on the printout, though).

Here’s another, enhanced picture – the colors are much lighter than in reality; but at least you can see the shapes (which are just pinned, not sewn down yet):

At the point when I took these pictures, I had already used approximately 9,000 (nine thousand!) 2mm beads. Just thought I should mention it. As you can probably see, those 9.000 beads (which I at first ESTIMATED to be enough for the entire front piece!) roughly cover HALF of what has to be beaded.

Here is a picture of the finished beading; though it’s VERY difficult to photograph.
There are now approximately 20,000 black bugle beads, about 300 faceted black iridescent (AB coated) beads (which I randomly used just to add some extra sparkle), and about 300 beads of two types of gold beads (round and faceted – the latter in two sizes) on it. It weights approximately four pounds now.
Just so you can compare, there’s an exhibit picture of the original beaded piece on the left side, and my beaded piece is on the right side. Of course you can click to enlarge it:

As for the top of this front piece, there’s a beaded shape with a stylized ‘Naboo flower’ on it; here’s an exhibit picture of the original piece:

I beaded that on an extra piece of velvet.
To do this, I started by digitizing the rough outline for my embroidery machine; then, with the velvet covered with water-soluble stabilizer (just so the embroidery threads won’t sink into the velvet pile; the stabilizer can be washed out when the entire beading is finished!), I embroidered those outlines on my machine:

Then I took some REAL Edwardian, jet-beaded trim (of which the silk netting backing has practically dissolved over time; so it’s no more usable) from my collection…

….and just started beading. All the black beads are taken from the Edwardian jet-beaded trim; the golden beads (which are actually ‘old gold’) are new:

Almost complete:

Finished, with the stabilizer backing washed away. Now I need to hem it and add the shorter fringe to the bottom of it:

I’ve finished the entire front piece by now; and Mother Nature was gentle, because the sun was shining so I could take pictures outside!

Here are the pictures of the finished beaded front piece. Of course the pictures can’t really capture the sparkle that comes from all the beads and the sequin backing. I’m totally in love with this thing – and during the time when I don’t wear it as a dress, it will become a decorative wall hanging piece. I can easily push a rod through the top to make that happen!

The complete beaded piece. (Obviously, I pinned it over the top of my Apailana kimono!		The beaded tassel that’s at the lower end of the beaded piece.	The top of the beading, with the hanging down fringes .

After finishing the beaded front piece, I can now go on to making the overdress, sleeves and collar.

  Navigation for this part
of the page:

• Queen Jamillia, StarWars
• Planning
• Beading the front piece
• Overdress, sleeves & collar
• Embroidered underdress
• Finished costume

Queen Jamillia – the crushed taffeta overdress, sleeves and collar

The overdress

I’ve started to make the overdress by using the Patterns of Fashion Loose gown.
I cut the pieces for front, side gores, back and an additional gore for the center back out from sturdy cotton fabric.
Then I laid those pattern pieces of cotton fabric out on crushed black taffeta, pinned them to it, and basted the black taffeta to it by sewing it down on the cotton along the length-wise crush.

After I had basted all the cotton pieces to the taffeta, I cut the pieces out and just assembled the overdress. Surprisingly the only thing I had to change compared to the original gown was to tuck approximately 2-3 inches of fabric under at the front opening; other than that, it immediately looked like the Jamillia overdress. To “overcome” the “back-pulling effect” of the large back gore which I added to make it look more like the real Jamillia costume, I added a waistband on the inside of the gown, which I tacked down on the side seams. That way the sides of the gown lie smooth along the body while the back with the gore can flare out.

Here are some pictures taken outside in the sun. Note that I had to lighten them a bit since the black crushed taffeta is SO black that, well, otherwise the crush effect wouldn’t have been visible. The overdress is worn over my Pelican gown farthingale; the triangular beaded piece is just pinned to the dress mannequin:

Now I need to hand stitch the front edge and the hem, which are just pinned in these pictures.

The sleeves

The sleeves, and that part I’ve studied pretty closely in the exhibit pictures, seem to be more like some kind of ‘cape’. That means I’m not sure if the wing-like sleeves are attached to the overdress or not.

I’ve started on them by drafting a pattern, then cut that out in a sturdy cotton fabric, and lay those cotton fabric pieces of the cape / sleeves out on the crushed taffeta.

The original sleeves do have a certain direction into which the crushed taffeta runs; so I tried to imitate that the best I could by laying them out in precisely that manner:

Sturdy cotton fabric sleeves / cape pieces laid out on the crushed taffeta.
And yes, the cotton fabric has a pattern on it. I bought it years ago and made something else from it; so these are basically just remnants. I need the cotton fabric to stabilize the sleeve ‘wings’, so they won’t collapse.

 After pinning the cotton pieces to the taffeta, then sewing along all edges and basting the taffeta to the cotton fabric, I assembled the sleeves / cape. Here’s a first test fitting of that cape-like winged sleeves over the overdress:

There’s still no lining in the sleeves. Also, of course, the embroidered trim is still missing; and so is the collar. But I have the impression that this is the correct shape for the sleeves / cape.

A picture of the sleeve trim embroidery in progress:

The first of four frames of sleeve trim being embroidered. The fabric is on the bias (at a 45 degree angle from the weft direction) so I can basically use it like bias trim on the curved sleeve.

Here is another pic of all the almost-finished pieces pinned to the dress mannequin. The trim on the sleeves isn’t sewn down yet:

You can see where the embroidery basically ‘stops’ at approximately mid front.
Also, collar turtleneck on the collar still missing; and the trims on the sleeves aren’t basted down yet, just pinned.
As I said – just to see what it looks like so far… and I like it

The Collar

Collar embroidery in progress. You can see the connector stitches (black thread), which I have to cut manually – while embroidering. For that I have to pause the machine 10 times per frame, on average.

Cutting the aforementioned connector stitches.
Most people prefer small scissors for that job, I like to do it with large scissors simply because they allow me to reach farther on the embroidery hoop.
Why DO I have to cut the connectors while embroidering and not afterwards, when everything is finished?
Because otherwise, the machine might embroider over them again, making it more difficult to cut them in the end.

Here’s the first half of the collar trim. It still needs to be sewn to a velvet base and I still need to cut some of the connector stitches that the embroidery machine leaves behind but I guess you get an impression. Since the collar trim has to be embroidered in a curve, it’s pretty difficult:

First glimpse at the first embroidered half of the embroidered Jamillia collar trim

And here’s the finished collar embroidery (still not attached to the velvet; or the stiff interfacing base. I am using ‘Decovil’, an interfacing often used to create stiffer handbags, by the way. This will be sandwiched between the layers of velvet / trim and satin lining of the collar.

To make the comparison between my reproduction and the original easier, I’ve prepared pics that show both. Note that the pictures of my embroidery were taken outside, in the sun; so they’re more beige-ish and not as bright as the original embroideries (of which the pictures were taken inside, with a flash – in case of the back view, obviously from a greater distance).
In the picture of the original collar from the front, you can see the satin lining that’s inside the collar very well (right side of picture; collar towards the back of the shoulder).

The embroideries aren’t 100% in the places where they are on the original collar; but other than that I think I got the pattern pretty well nailed on.

Here’s the collar with the trims and the black velvet base sewn down to the stabilizer. Also, the satin lining is in place, too – just that you can’t see it. The collar doesn’t sit so well since it’s just pinned. The trim on the sleeves isn’t sewn down yet, which is why it looks weird:

Continue reading the dress diary by going to the embroidered underdress.

• Queen Jamillia, StarWars
• Planning
• Beading the front piece
• Overdress, sleeves & collar
• Embroidered underdress
• Finished costume

Queen Jamillia – the embroidered underdress

I’ll repeat some of the things I wrote on the planning page:

I had to basically “piece” the embroidery together from various exhibit photos (because some that were taken from certain angles show parts of the embroidery which are hidden by the overdress and / or the triangular piece when seen from the front).

Here’s what my pieced-up collage of the embroideries looks like. Note that the images, if you click them to see the full size, are HUGE – they’re basically lifesize:

Center front, complete – red line indicates the center; note that I only pieced up HALF of the embroideries (left side) because the other side is symmetrically mirrored:

Front side (left side, to be precise) turned straight – again, the red line indicates the center front (which, since I turned the embroideries, is at an angle):

Bottom center front:

And here’s the preview of the embroideries that I’ve digitized from that collage. Again, the images are huge, but not as large as the ones above. Red lines indicate a) the center front and b), in some cases, where I have to change the hoop for the embroideries (remember, those are MACHINE embroideries!). Of course you’re free to compare those previews to the original, pieced collages above; and, in case you find apparently huge mistakes, I hope you’ll point them out to me.

Front side:

Center front:

And now on to actually embroidering that monster.

I’ll just post progress pictures that I took every few frames that I’ve embroidered:

Center front and parts of first side embroidered (fifth frame / 8 hours of work so far in this pic)

Second side being embroidered (eighth frame / 11 hours of work so far in this pic)

When I had embroidered 15 frames (which took 28 hours…) on the center front piece, I pinned the fabric to the dress mannequin with all the other pieces of the costume, just to see what it looks like… here’s the result:

You can see where the embroidery basically ‘stops’ at approximately mid front.
Also, collar turtleneck still missing; and the trims on the sleeves aren’t basted down yet, just pinned.
As I said – just to see what it looks like so far… and I like it

Here’s a closeup on the center front bottom embroidery up to that point (left); compared to an exhibit pic of the original Queen Jamillia gown (right) – click to see a larger version of the image:

There are a few spots where my embroidery isn’t precisely like the original embroideries, but I think I can live with that

And now… on to embroidering the last 8 frames of that front piece!

Embroidery FINISHED! And yes, I cried when the last stitch was made.

The panel of embroidered velvet draped on the dress mannequin

Note that I’ve edited the top of the embroideries last minute. I thought it would be nice to have the typical Naboo symbol in the embroideries, too; so I digitized that and included it in the design. Also, I added a ‘Queen Jamillia’, my name and the current year – 2012 – on top of the embroidered panel – in a Naboo font.
No one will ever see the Naboo symbol or the text. They’re both hidden by the beaded triangular piece. The symbol and text are just there for me; to “know” that they are there. Also, since it’s a Naboo font, probably no one would ever be able to read it anyway.

Spot the Naboo symbol! Hint: It’s almost at the center of this picture.
The text I mentioned is on top, to left and right of the center ‘heart’; embroidered in beige thread.

 And now… on to the finished costume. Navigation for this part
of the page:

• Queen Jamillia, StarWars
• Planning
• Beading the front piece
• Overdress, sleeves & collar
• Embroidered underdress
• Finished costume

Queen Jamillia – the completed costume

I finished the Jamillia costume in two steps:

The first was a test run, taking place at the local Carnival (Karneval) in Recklinghausen, Germany. It wasn’t a planned test run. My son is a great fan of the 501st German Garrison and always wanted to see them in person. When I found out that they would have a place in the “Karnevalsumzug” (which is the German term for the carnival’s parade), I secretly decided that he should see them; particularly he had been working hard at school lately and improved all his grades.
Unfortunately, I only found out about them being there a few days before the carnival; so I only had very few time to finish the Jamillia dress and to make a remotely acceptable Darth Vader costume for my son.

In the end, neither the Jamillia nor the Vader costume were completely finished for the parade. My Jamillia had so many pins in it that I was scared that someone would hug me and kill him- or herself. The Vader costume was missing the chest armor, the codpiece, proper boots and the lining for the cloak; and the backside of the top suit was pretty crudely closed.

Yet and still, that first test run was more successful than I would ever have expected. We stopped counting the numbers of “Oh, Darth Vader!”, “Look, Star Wars!”, “AMIDALA!!!” (wtf?), “Luke, I’m your father!” and people humming the Star Wars anthem when we passed them by; also, we were photographed by approximately 200 people. My son almost broke into tears when I spotted the 501st and asked him, “Lord Vader, ready to meet your troops? There’s the 501st coming.” And we got some very positive “Thumbs up” by the 501st people; and one of them even left the parade for a minute or two and talked to me and my son.

The test run also showed me some things that I have to change / improve on the gown. For example, the black overdress has a tendency of slipping ‘backwards’, revealing way more of the white underdress than it should; so I have to add velcro or snaps to keep it in place. And my beaded front piece was constantly slipping to left or right on the dress, so I have to fix that in place, too. Also, the mother of pearl slices at the very top of the headdress are too high, I have to cut them down (and seriously didn’t notice this when making the headdress!)

Here are some pictures of what my son and me looked like. These were taken after the parade. My lipstick has started to run over my lower lip during the parade (that’s something I’ll have to fix somehow, too!). The “glow” on my collar isn’t photoshopped; it’s a raindrop on the camera lens – it started raining just in time after the parade. Also, in the side view, note my very dirty hem. My son managed to constantly step on that hem during the parade.

And just for the records… here’s my son’s Darth Vader costume. I made everything except the front of the face mask and the boots – he helped a lot, of course:

Last not least, some links to other people who have reproduced the Queen Jamillia costume:

• Adrelia’s Jamillia; more pics here and here
• Lightning Count’s Jamillia 
• Reproductions listed on Padawansguide

If you, too, have made a Jamillia costume and want to be included in this list, please don’t hesitate to comment on this entry with a link to your website and I will surely add you!

In case you came here over a different link, please consider reading the entire dress diary starting here. Navigation for this part
of the page:

• Queen Jamillia, StarWars
• Planning
• Beading the front piece
• Overdress, sleeves & collar
• Embroidered underdress
• Finished costume

Like, for example, when I was planning my Jamillia costume, the one thing that kept me from even starting on it for a considerable time (from 2005 to 2012, to be precise!) was the considerable cost of abalone shells, which are required for the headdress and which are really, really expensive:

Any substitute I could think of didn’t work. Painting didn’t achieve the correct appearance. And anything else, well, I couldn’t THINK of anything else.

Until, at the very end of 2011, I happened upon a material called drum wrap. That’s what you see on fancy drums – you know – the glittering, shiny stuff drummers use to make their drum sets look extra fancy. Here’s a Google link to some images, in case you’re not familiar with it – you should REALLY have a look at that link since it shows a large variety of drum wrap designs.

Still reluctant if that stuff was even remotely suitable for my project, I ordered a strip of it that would be enough for the headdress and some tests.
I was positively surprised when it arrived!

Drum Wrap by Delmar in “White Ripple” – I ordered mine from STdrums, they offer pre-cut sizes so I was able to order just what I needed

That strip of drum wrap cost me just over $20, by the way.

I was a bit worried about how bendable it would be, if I would be able to cut it, and so on. No need to worry!

It’s about as thick as the the plastic that’s used for plastic yoghurt cups.

One of the people I talked to about the material when discovering it suspected that ‘it probably couldn’t be bent more than a foot or it would break’. Well, Dirk, I don’t know how thick your fingers are, but…..

Drum wrap bending – well, I can bend it around my finger.
That, by the way, is as much as it can be bent before getting a permanent crease.
And while my hands are large and my fingers are thick, they’re definitely not “a foot” thick, Dirk

But here’s the coolest thing…

...if using a strong needle and a slow speed, you can even SEW THROUGH the drum wrap.
(I only did four stitches to see if it would work, but yes, it DOES work!)

In other words, I’m totally sold on drum wrap, and am very much looking forward to make my Jamillia headdress using it.
I plan to do more tests – like, for example, how bendable / manipulable it becomes when heated up – and will publish the results here when I’m finished with them.

But for the moment, I can definitely say that drum wrap will be my future choice of material when looking for unusual material surfaces

A pretty thorough research site (image wise that is) for Queen Apailana’s costume can be found at Padawansguide.
Just in case you have no idea who ‘Queen Apailana’ may possibly be, watch Star Wars, Episode 3. At the end, when Padmé / Amidala’s funeral is going on, take a good look at the mourners; among them is the current Queen of Naboo (namely, Queen Apailana), wearing this outfit.

Material statistics (I’m updating this while I make the costume and use / acquire the materials; so until the costume is complete and this part of this sentence has disappeared, this list is NOT complete!):

Material	Used for	Amount
‘Diamonds’ brocade	Kimono, outer fabric	7 meters (7.7 yards)
Stiff cotton fabric	Kimono lining	5 meters (5.5 yards)
Fabric dye, reddish purple	Kimono lining (except sleeves)	3 packages
Silk / rayon fabric	Kimono sleeve lining	2 meters (2.2 yards)
Velvet	Kimono trims	~1 meter (1.1 yards)
Embroidery thread, silver	Kimono trims	2 spools @ 200m / 220 yards each
Embroidery thread, gold	Kimono trims	1/2 spool @ 200m / 220 yards each
Sticky stabilizer	Kimono trims	~ 1 square meter / 9 square feet
Fabric dye, blue	Kimono trims (the velvet I had was reddish purple; I overdyed that with blue to get closer to the blueish purple on the original trims)	1 package
Embroidery thread, dark grey	Lace headpiece	2 spools @ 1000m / 1100 yards each
Embroidery thread, light grey	Lace headpiece	2 spools @ 1000m / 1100 yards each
Water-soluble stabilizer	Lace headpiece	~ 1 square meter / 9 square feet
Silk / rayon fabric	Hakama	5 meters / 5.5 yards
Silk matelasse	Under-Kimono “blouse”	2 meters (2.2 yard)
Fabric dye, dusty pink	Under-Kimono “blouse”	1 package
Silk matelasse ‘fans’	Obi	0.9 meters (1 yard)
Totals (so far):	Fabrics	23.9 meters
	Embroidery thread	~4.500 meters (4545 yards)
(no one said this would be a quick, easy and / or cheap costume using few resources, right? )

The embroidered trim

I’ve started on the Apailana costume by doing a test embroidery for the trim that’s used on the front of the kimono. Here’s the result of that test embroidery:

The (test) embroidered trim for Queen Apailana still attached to the frame of the embroidery machine. The plastic over the velvet helps to keep the pile down while the embroideries are placed over it; it can be torn away when the embroideries are finished. The velvet is a scrap that I had left from Beatrice D’Este’s Tomb dress.	The finished embroidery (well, about 10 inches respectively three repeats of the pattern of it – it’s just a test embroidery, remember?…) on the left (with my hand holding it), compared to the original embroideries (on the right; exhibit photo). I guess I need to dye my velvet a tad more blueish, but other than that, I guess it looks good

Just for the usual statistics records… what you’re seeing above (three repeats of the embroidery pattern; mirrored to become left / right side of the Kimono trim; each approximately 10 inches long, 1 1/2 inches wide) has 10,398 stitches, is stitched with two colors (metallic silver and gold, obviously) and takes about 45 minutes to embroider by machine.
It would work MUCH faster with non-metallic thread, but metallic thread is prone to break if the machine is running too fast, so I have to adjust the speed of the machine down to cope with that.
Also, of course, I digitized the embroidery myself; from two pictures of the original trim embroideries, as seen in the exhibit photos.

The outer Kimono fabric

As for the darn, unobtainable metallic ‘arrowhead’ brocade (which I’m tempted to dub the  ‘Unobtainium fabric’, *lol*!) which was used for the outer kimono, I’ve spent YEARS searching for it, but without success. But I happened upon the following, diamond-patterned brocade, which remotely looks like the arrowhead brocade:

As you can probably see, the shiny threads (which are apparently rayon, unlike the backing, which is polyester) are copper instead of silver. I hope that I can bleach the fabric, so that the rayon threads will become maybe light silver/copperish to white, which would work very well in getting pretty close to the appearance of the original fabric.  So far I’ve just ordered that fabric, so the test whether I can bleach it or not is still up to be taken.

By now I’ve taken that bleach test (and also dyed the velvet for the trim a tad more purple. Here’s the result:

Top: Velvet in previous color; bottom: Velvet (with the embroideries) in the slightly more blue, over-dyed shade; which should now match the original velvet.
Bottom: Left: Diamond brocade in its original color; center: After one batch of careful bleaching; right: After second batch of careful bleaching.
Note how the shiny rayon threads look almost like metallic threads (compared to the velvet above it, which IS embroidered with metallic threads!); which is something I very much hoped for
I guess I need to use a less blue-ish silver for the embroideries, though, so they match the bleached brocade better; but I already have such an embroidery thread.

Also, just to compare the bleached end result with the fabric of the original Apailana costume brocade…:

Yay! I’d say that’s it!
It’s not an exact match (I said that before, didn’t I? And also, the comparison pic isn’t to scale; the diamonds are smaller in person compared to the original fabric pattern – maybe like “two diamonds per arrow”, if that makes sense), but I think the colors color looks correct, which is what was important to me in the first place.

After I had bleached the fabric, I started making the outer kimono.
Here are the first two pics; they show front and back of the outer kimono. Sleeves (of course with accurately piped seams!) are already attached and I’ve pinned the embroidered trim to it. The pics are taken with a flash, so it’s a bit brighter than in person:

The sleeves aren’t “stiff” enough yet, because the lining in the entire top is still missing. That will soon change, however

I’ve decided to basically ‘split’ the kimono where the obi will cover it. That’s because I had to watch the pattern of the fabric, and wouldn’t have had enough fabric if I had cut the parts in one piece.
It’s still taking almost 6 meters / 6 yards of fabric, by the way; and that’s just the outer fabric – double the amount for lining as well. Also, piping and trim velvet are not included in that calculation!

The inner Kimono fabric

The fabric of the inner kimono, best to be seen at the sleeves and the neckline, is a dusky pink cloqué fabric, which is laid out in pleats (some people would call that ‘large pintucks’) along the neckline and around the sleeves.

The skirt- and outer Kimono lining fabric

The pleated skirt (actually, because of the fact that the pleating on left / right side of front is facing towards the center, I don’t believe it’s a “skirt” but a Japanese hakama – read more below!) that’s worn beneath the outer Kimono (and which is only visible at the center front bottom opening of said outer kimono) is some kind of fine, “pinstriped”, closely woven silk taffeta.

The very same fabric was used to actually line the sleeves of the outer kimono; this is pretty obvious from some of the larger exhibit photos:

I think I found a good substitute for that fabric; it just has the wrong color:

…so nothing like being able to dye your own fabrics, right?
The fabric is a rayon / silk blend; so I may be successful with the ‘separate’ dyes for silk and rayon method. Also, since it’s already blue, I just need to use reddish dyes to achieve the purple look of the original fabric.

On the subject of what that garment actually is, I have made this interesting observation:

In the official photos, you can see lots of the “thing” that’s beneath her kimono (click the image to enlarge!):

but you can only see that it’s obviously pleated, not a) what it’s made of or b) into which direction the pleats are facing.

The exhibit photos show a much tinier gap between the two sides of the silver / platinum colored kimono, but ONE exhibit photo gave it all away – color, material, and, in my opinion, surprisingly also what type of garment this is. It’s this photo (enlarge to see the details):

That, dearest readers, shows that the pleats of whatever she is wearing are all facing towards the center front of, well, whatever it is. Plus, there seems to be a center pleat. Also, you can see the shininess and color of the material very well, which seems to be a kind of taffeta woven with mottled yarn (which gives the pinstriped effect – see the fabric picture I posted above).

Anyway, there’s only ONE garment I can think of – particularly in combination with what looks like a kimono and an obi! – that can possibly have pleats which are facing inwards; and that is a hakama. Here is a convenient link to a Google image search, in case you have no idea what a “hakama” may be – basically, it’s a martial arts type of skirt-pants garment.
And yes, there are various types of hakamas -some with many pleats, some with fewer pleats, made from very different materials, fancy and not-so-fancy hakamas and so on.
But they all have one thing in common – the pleats are always facing towards the center front

The obi / sash

The obi (or sash) is made from a matelasse, brocade or jacquard fabric that seems to has some kind of stylized fans woven into it. It’s dark, blueish purple and the color matches the velvet.
A very likely matelasse is available at Golden Silks, which is where I ordered it to make the obi. It’s white, but it’s silk, so I can dye it. Here’s a picture that compares the original obi fabric – I have enhanced the photo to show the obi pattern detail – to the Golden Silks matelasse (white square):

It’s not an exact match, but I think it will work very well for the obi; particularly if dyed purple.

The headdress

The headdress that Queen Apailana wears is an interesting piece, and just because it consists of so many different pieces, it’s very easy to get confused while looking at it.
So when I was planning my reproduction, I first broke it down by looking at some really large pictures and find out what those different pieces are.
Here’s my initial studying picture – which, when printed out, is 120cm wide and lifesize for my reproduction! – in which I numbered the individual pieces; I will break those numbers down in the table and text below:

1. The Marabou “fan”
2. The silver “arch”
3. The ear “eggs”
4. Beaded lace appliqués
   This is actually interesting, and to see it, you need to look at the headpiece REALLY CLOSE.
   Like this:
   What you’re seeing here is NOT just a mass of pearls. Well, that too – but somewhere in between and bordering them, there are those ‘worm-like’, anthracite “structures”; and that’s a lace appliqué – which was then beaded with pearls. According to my ‘lifesize’ picture, for my own headpiece, those have to be 4mm and 6mm pearls.
   But the base – the lace appliqué – must of course come first!
   Again, good that I have an embroidery machine and can actually digitize lace. To do that, I first took all available pictures of the lace that was used in the headpiece, and used those to digitize my lace.
   Here’s what my lace looks like in my embroidery software (which, in this case, is Stitch Era Universal – simply because it has more (and more suitable!) fill patterns than Brother’s PE-Design which I usually use!):
   If you compare this to the picture of the original part of the headpiece with the lace underlay above, you can probably “see” the lace in the original headpiece much better.After digitizing it, I started to embroider that lace on my embroidery machine. Here are the single steps of the embroidery process:

   	Embroidering the first layer of the stabilizing background on water-soluble stabilizer (two layers of that). In case you’re not sure that your end result of the stabilizing background will be, well, stabilizing enough, you can always add a layer of tulle or netting between the two layers of stabilizer (which I didn’t do because I was sure that mine would be sufficiently dense); that will help stabilize it even more.
   A second layer of embroidery is added over the first. Remember, I’m embroidering lace; so the layers have to be so dense that they will basically stabilize themselves in the end, without any fabric backing – hence the water-soluble stabilizer
   	The third layer of embroidery being done. Note that I’m simultaneously embroidering THREE pieces of lace in one frame. The one in the front already has the third layer finished; the one where the needle is is about to embroider said third layer.
   Third layer of stabilizing backing for the lace is embroidered; now I’m adding the backup stitches for the “worms” (which are actually the only thing that is visible in the original picture!)
   	Stabilizing of “worms” almost finished on two of the three lace pieces.
   After the backing and the stabilizing parts of the “worms” are finished, I’m adding a layer of craft foam (or rubber foam /”puffy” – whatever you want to call it) over the entire embroidery in the frame. I’m using tiny pieces of sticky tape (in places where no embroidery is) to fix it on the embroidery frame so it won’t move when it’s embroidered. The reason is really simple: The “worms” on the headdress are somewhat threedimensional; and the craft foam will make sure that the very last layer of embroidery WILL be 3D.
   	Here you can see how the first tiny pieces of the final ‘worms’ are being embroidered over the craft foam. Note that it’s advisable to use a foam of which the color is very close to the thread’s color. Also, the embroidery that’s done over the craft foam should be digitized in satin stitches (with NO half stitches!) ONLY; otherwise the 3D effect won’t be as it should be. Thickness of this foam is 2mm; for larger embroideries (with satin stitch spans larger than, say, 5mm) you can use 3mm or 4mm foam, to make the embroidery even more 3D.
   The “worms” are mostly finished in this picture.
   	After they’re entirely finished, I’m roughly cutting out the single lace pieces on the water soluble stabilizer. No need to cut really close to the embroidery because the stabilizer will be washed away in the end.
   I’m using my fingernails (and, in case of really tiny parts, a pinning needle) to tear away the parts of craft foam which are not covered with embroidery. The embroidery of the “worms” has to be really dense (like 4.5 – 5 stitches / mm) so that a) the foam will be completely covered and b) the craft foam is pierced sufficiently to be easily torn away.
   	Result after peeling / tearing most of the craft foam off. There are still some tiny bits in very small places; I will pry those off after washing the lace pieces. However, you want to have torn away most of the craft foam at this stage. Otherwise the foam prevents the stabilizer to be washed out properly.
   Washing the lace pieces in my hand under warm water in the sink. It’s really best to do that by hand and one by one. Note that in this picture, the stabilizer is just wet (and basically becomes transparent), but…
   	…a few seconds later the stabilizer is completely gone. You want to slightly squeeze your embroidery while washing it just so that really all of the stabilizer is washed out. In case your embroidery basically dissolves with the stabilizer, your backing embroidery wasn’t dense enough, and you can go back to digitizing
   The finished and dried embroidery. Note how the “worms” are now threedimensional, while the “backing” embroidery (which I will still have to bead with the pearls) is not – just the effect I needed

   (To be continued)

5. Strands of pearls
   From my ‘lifesize’ picture, I could make out four different type of pearl strands that hang down / are twisted on the headdress:

   Alternating: 5 3mm pearls / 2 4mm pearls / 5 3mm pearls / 3 long (twisted?) bugle beads, 2mm wide, 12mm long / repeat. Alternating: one 6mm pearl / 2 long (twisted?) bugle beads; 2mm wide, 12mm long / repeat. Alternating: ~ 22 (number is NOT clearly visible in pictures!) faceted (cut) seed beads, 3mm long, 2 mm wide; 1 6mm pearl / repeat. Alternating: 8 4mm pearls / 1 6mm pearl / repeat. Those pearl strands DO have slight variations on the headdress (give or take a pearl / bead or two in the aforementioned arrangements…); but basically, it’s always those four types of pearl strands. The colors of the pearls are difficult. In some pictures they look like ‘old gold’, other pictures show them as almost black (like anthracite); and in some pictures they seem almost iridescent, or maybe mauve / lavender, and also silver. The cut seed beads and (twisted?) bugle beads are definitely some kind of gold color; also, they’re NOT gold lined, but have the coating on the outside. I also suspect they may be AB coated since in some pictures, they seem to have some kind of colored hue. Personally I think it’s best to get pearls from a variety of suppliers according to the sizes that I’ve written above, in various shades of grey / anthracite / old silver / mauve / AB coated, and just use ALL of those randomly to achieve the look of the original headdress.

   The arrangement of those strands of pearls is best visible in two pictures; namely these:

   You can, for example, see that each side of the front lace piece has the following strand types attached (starting from center front – and yes, those are symmetrical on both sides):
   4-3-3-1-3-2-4-2-3-2-4 etc. etc.
   Why yes, that’s insane if I want it EXACTLY like that. It would be MUCH easier to just go ahead, buy SOME strands of seed beads, cylinder beads and pearls and arrange them SOMEHOW. Also, I think that this headdress must be pretty heavy with all those pearls. But it’s pretty
   I’ve tried to count (actually it’s more like estimated) the number of strands for each of the above mentioned types.
   I came up with (this is for both sides!):
   - 24 strands of type 1;
   - 22 strands of type 2;
   - 28 strands of type 3;
   - 40 strands of type 4.

   That results in the following amounts of pearls / bugles / seeds required:

   - long (twisted?) bugle beads: 576 (type 1) + 748 (type 2) =  1.324
   - 3mm pearls: 1.920 (type 1) + ~250 for lace = ~2.200
   - 4mm pearls: 384 (type 1) + 2.560 (type 4) + ~200 for lace= ~3.000
   - 6mm pearls: 196 (type 2) + 196 (type 3) + 320 (type 4) + ~80 for lace = ~800
   - cut seed beads, 3x2mm: 4,312 (type 3)

   So all in all, that’s no less than approximately 11,636 pearls, beads and bugles which I will have to put on that headdress. If each of them just weights 1/10 gram, that’s more than one kilogram of pearls. And that’s JUST the pearls, without the structure.  -.-

Padmé Amidala – Star Wars Episode 2 – Blue Tattooine Poncho

The blue Star Wars Tattooine Poncho of Padmé / Amidala is something I’ve been wanting to do for a LONG time for myself. I’ve made it in 2003 for a customer; and ever since, I’ve been wanting it for myself; but never really got to actually making it.
Then I basically ‘inherited’ a huge amount of well-dyeable linen (some of which I’ve also used for my ‘Waterhouse Ophelia’ gown); and when I had leftovers from cutting the Ophelia dress - even if the linen I dyed for that gown is a tad lighter than what I’d need for this one – it dawned me that I should finally at least make this damn poncho (not the dress that’s worn beneath it yet) since it works very well as everyday clothing when being worn with jeans and a shirt beneath it, IMHO.
I also didn’t re-dye it; the medium blue of the Ophelia gown works pretty well, IMHO, for my very own version of Padmé’s Poncho.

Let’s analyze the original poncho first.

This is the most crucial part: the sleeve seam. As you can see from the picture (marked red in the right one), there’s a seam that runs from the shoulder to approximately the crook of the arm (elbow height), and then, *just* then, there’s the horizontal seam that connects an actual sleeve (namely, the piece of fabric that has the flames painted to it) to that.
Also, the ‘outer’ part of that lower sleeve (which sits right over the top of the hand) is much shorter than the ‘inner’ part of it; and there’s a slight curve at the inside seam. You can see that pretty well here:

Here is the sewing pattern which I’ve drafted from looking at pictures of the original poncho.
It should be pretty conclusive; also, of course, you can very easily draft it down using your own measurements (and if you do so and have your own website… it would be somehow fair to link to this page, don’t you think? ):

Click the image to enlarge. Of course you have to cut the sleeve TWICE. I haven’t written that down on the pattern, but it should be obvious!
Also, the pattern is NOT to scale; so you can’t exactly just blow it up to get a working pattern. If you want to draft it out for yourself, use grid paper and your own measurements.

The flames on the upper arm are, actually painted. Here’s how I did mine:

I used clear contact paper (that stuff with the grid paper backing – that helps a LOT to cut the flames to scale!), opaque textile paint and a brush.
First, I cut a strip of that contact paper; as wide as the roll was and as long as (flames + 2 inches). Then I cut the contact paper to achieve the ‘flames’ basic shape; each of my flames is one grid square ‘wide’ (which is 1cm, since my grid is 1x1cm. In case you’re working with inch-grid-paper, you’ll probably want to go for 1 flame every HALF inch; that’s still a tad larger than what I did (1/2 inch = 1.25cm), but I think that would work as well.
Then, peel off the backing and stick the adhesive clear plastic to your sleeve fabric, right at the top. Be careful to follow the weaving pattern while doing so.

After that, start to paint; always going from the ‘red’ part to the ‘yellow’ part. I usually paint red first, then yellow. When you’ve finished both colors, there’ll be a hard edge between the two colors. Blend that by basically ‘dotting’ that hard edge with a mix of red and yellow.

You can tear the clear adhesive plastic off as soon as the paint has dried. Now you should have red / yellow flames. I do recommend to PRACTICE this before you work on an ‘actual’ sleeve, though (you can still use the ‘practice’ piece of fabric to make a matching handbag for your poncho!).

The other decorations on the original costume are also painted in some places (like the ‘flames’ at the center front circle, for example!), but I’ve decided to embroider them entirely (just because I like embroideries better – believe me, even WITH an embroidery machine they’re NOT ‘easier’ or ‘faster’ to make!).

How many stitches do those embroideries have?

Just because I love statistics, here’s a table that should be conclusive. Note that ‘left’ and ‘right’ half of the circle differ since the ‘center’ parts of the circle embroideries are just in the ‘right’ half, not in the ‘left’ one. Also, keep in mind that the sleeve embroideries have to be done twice (left and right) – the table takes that into consideration (by ‘x2′ the number of one embroidery):

Preview in embroidery software (PE-Design by Brother, in my case)	Item	Stitches	Result
	Left half of circle (I had to split the circle in half since the entire circle would NOT fit into my embroidery machine’s frame!)	24,237	x1= 24,237
	Right half of circle	25,119	x1= 25,119
	Upper arm	4,591	x2= 9,182
	Lower arm	4,366	x2= 8,732
	Neckline end (has a shorter ‘upwards point’ than the lower arm embroidery and is therefore NOT the same!)	3,998	x1=3,998
	Overall stitches		71,268

So all together, there are over 71,000 (seventy-one thousand!) stitches in the embroideries of my poncho.
It took me about a week to digitize, then embroider all of them (that’s about 40 hours, if you like hours better than weeks ). And that’s just because I’m practiced with my embroidery software and the machine, of course.

Here’s what my finished embroideries look like on the fabric.
Please take into consideration that the ‘hen’s feet’ embroidery around the neckline, the sleeves, and on certain parts of the front ‘circle’ have to be done by hand; so they’re not in these pictures yet:

Upper sleeve	Neckline and front circle	Upper- and lower sleeve

And here’s a first picture of the finished embroideries on my dress mannequin.
Note that I haven’t closed the side seams yet; just the shoulder- and top sleeve seams. Also, I haven’t cut out the neckline, the bottom front and the sleeve curve (towards the hand) yet; I like to keep those things uncut until I have finished the ‘chicken feet’ embroideries, which, as I have already mentioned, have to be done by hand.
The color is slightly off in this picture – the poncho is showing as some kind of bright aqua, but it’s really more a blue – see pictures of the embroideries above; those show the correct color:

 Here’s another one, taken by the window in sunlight. This one shows the color better; but has some shadow cast on the poncho:

Here are pictures of the finished poncho:

Here are some links to other reproductions of this costume:

• Reproduction by Two-Gingers (links to pictures at the bottom)
• Maggie’s Reproduction
• Kristy’s Reproduction
• Various reproductions listed on Padawansguide

If you, too, have made a reproduction of this costume and want to be included in this list, don’t hesitate to comment on this entry with a link to your website and I will surely add you!

This is a gown that I’ve been wanting to make for quite a long time – Ophelia, as seen in John William Waterhouse’s painting:

Now, this is clearly not a ‘Medieval’ gown. It’s not a ‘Fantasy’ gown either. The correct term for a gown like this is a ‘Pre-Raphaelite’ gown, derived from the term used for this kind of painting. Just thought I should type this down for clarification

Let’s observe the painting for a moment.

There’s the overdress – blue – which has an interesting, pinkish-purple kind of ‘shimmer’ along the folds. That makes me believe that the fabric is either a changeant weave (which means – warp and weft threads of the fabric have different colors, or, in other terms, the fabric was yarn-dyed) or maybe that the blue fabric is a pretty much open weave (as in, not quite opaque) and that there’s a pinkish-reddish lining beneath it which shines through.
The overdress has a gold-colored embroidery along the neckline, and there’s a golden guard with rampant lions along the hem of the skirt. Also, the top of the overdress is buttonned or pinned at the center front – no buttons are visible, but if you look closely, you’ll see that the fabric is “puckering” up in some, regularly spaced places where it’s pinned (or buttoned. or hooked…) together.
The sleeves, bell-shaped from the elbow down, are lined with a pinkish red fabric, which seems to have some sheen to it. The fact that the lining has this color would undermine my already mentioned theory of the gown being lined with a pinkish-red lining. The fact that you can see some golden lining at the bottom of the skirt isn’t necessarily proving this to be wrong; the golden lining could also be some kind of inside stabilizer for the ‘lions’ guard along the hem (which, on the other hand, is very obviously sewn on – you can see a tiny bit of blue fabric still showing at the center front hem, beneath the lions).

Then there’s the red underdress. This is definitely a different color than the sleeve lining; it’s much clearer and darker than said pinkish lining. From the skirt portion that can be seen beneath the hitched-up underskirt, I guess this is some kind of patterned damask.
Just like the overdress, this red dress, too, is pinned / buttoned / hooked along the center front; you can see that pretty clearly.
There seems to be a row of buttons along the lower part of the sleeve; this can be seen along the underarm that’s holding on to the tree; particularly at the inside wrist (bottom in the painting).

Now, beneath those two dresses, there’s yet something *else*. There’s a white ‘border’ beneath the red underdresses’ neckline (looking smocked). This isn’t split in front; it’s also not showing anywhere else. I think it’s safe to presume that this is a chemise or ‘shift’.

For my own version, I’ve decided for a blue linen overdress, lined with pinkish taffeta, embroidered in gold. The ‘Lions’ guard will be made from golden silk-organza; I’ll machine embroider the lions to that. The neckline embroidery will be golden too.

Here are some pics of what I’ve planned so far:

Neckline embroidery – it took me quite a bit of time (and three days) to get it right. It’s difficult to actually ‘see’ it in the painting; so, of course, I had to take quite a bit of artistic license. Click to enlarge:

Original Painting	First draft preview	Second draft preview	Third draft preview	Fourth draft preview	Fifth (and final) draft preview

This is what the fifth and final draft looks like when compared directly to the painting:

Here’s my embroidery design for the lions guard:

Original Painting	A first draft	First draft preview

Here are the first pictures of the finished neckline embroidery: