Saturday 9 June 2012

fancy dress; diy mermaid

I must admit, I do love a bit of fancy dress! Making an outfit gives me an opportunity to make the most of my crafty skills and to make something a little different! When I was younger I would skip along to the local costume store + easily spend £40+ on an outfit which would be worn only once + probably by a few people at the party, well not any more!! For my sister's 18th fancy dress party last weekend I chose to go as a mermaid (a little random I know!). By being a little creative + making use of my free time, this is what I came up with *drum roll*...



Tah-dah! What do you think? I loved making this costume + being a mermaid for the night!ha.. The whole thing cost me around £20 + a few hours of my time, totally worth it to have a completely unique outfit! The night was pretty much a whirl wind so I've only got these few with my sister (alice in wonderland) + her friend Bethan (mad hatter). I got inspiration from a variety of online images but in particular this makeup tutorial by Traci Hines, amazing! So this is how I set about transforming into a mermaid...

You will need;

Sequin Skirt
Two-tone Organza
White Bandeau Top
French Lavender + Tropical Green Dylon Fabric Dye
Mixed Bag of Pearl + Iridescent Sequins 
Various Sized Flat Back Pearls
Small Starfish
Handful of Shells
Pearl Necklace 
Glue (I used a UHU adhesive)


These little starfish slides were inspired by those in Traci's video. I did feel a bit off-ish about using real starfish but hey-ho! I bought the bag of mixed pearl + iridescent sequins from The Range for £1 and placed them into a Chinese take-away carton for easy storage. I also bought flat back pearls from eBay to decorate them with. I then used glue to stick the embellishment in place! I later used nail glue to attach bobby pins to the back et voila pearl encrusted starfish ready to wear in your mermaid hair!


I bought the bandeau top from eBay but really wouldn't recommend the seller I used. I ordered a cream bralet hoping to just stick on a shell + some pearls + be done, but when it arrived it was a tacky white colour + as I was so busy with uni' work I missed the time to exchange, GRR! Instead of wasting the awful thing I used fabric dyed which I had left over from past projects to rework it. I firstly dyed it all over lilac (to get rid of the white) then used basic tie dying techniques with a more saturated lilac mixture + the green. My idea was that it would look like anemone or sea urchins to keep in with the aquatic theme! I finally decorated it with pearls + iridescent sequins and added a few shells + starfish to the centre.



I followed Traci's tutorial for the make up + loved the way it turned out! Super easy + really effective!


I used my mad eBaying skills to hunt down this skirt; I did the super obvious of typing 'sequin skirt' into the search bar + watching every skirt that caught my eye! I didn't worry about what size they were as I knew I'd be able to adjust it to fit me when it arrived! The one I ended using I won for 99p, bargain! I then bought 2 lots two toned organza from my local fabric store + made the fin by cutting two rectangles with curved edges + sewing it to the bottom of the skirt! I made a make-shift belt out of a pearl necklace that I got from the Topshop sale to add a final mermaidy touch!


So what do you think? I hope I've not made it sound horribly difficult to do (I do ramble a bit!) but it really was super easy! My laptop charger arrived today so expect lots of posts from now on, yay!

PS Do you like my sister's 'Alice in Wonderland' costume, I made this for her too! *bragbragbrag* ahaha

12 comments:

  1. This is amazing! You are so creative.
    I wish I could do something like that! X

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    1. aw thank you!(: just need the internet + a bit of spare time!aha x

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  2. So amazing, you look gorgeous x

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  3. OMG! What an amazing costume! You are so talented.
    xx

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  4. i just found your blog and i follow you!great blog! could you tell me what color is your hair?

    sophie xx

    http://blogstylethings.blogspot.gr/

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  5. The costume is gorgeous. Great job!
    wedgesforlunch.blogspot.it

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  6. Awww your costume is fabulous darling and you look super pretty!

    Eda ♥

    Candyfloss Curls, Cupcakes and Couture

    Follow me on twitter

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  7. This costume is amazing, i love your blog. Can not wait to rad more xx

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  8. I love this! Great job, well done!
    I have a Peter Pan party coming up and my little niece has designated me Mermaid.
    You've given me some great inspiration. Thanks.
    Claudia x

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  9. You are really so creative! I love the costume. I am planning on making some little mermaid costumes for teenagers for their Halloween party! This is a really nice inspiration.

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  11. Great Content.I have appreciate with getting lot of good and reliable information with your post.......
    Thanks for sharing such kind of nice and wonderful collection......again, beautiful :) I love reading your posts. They make me happy .
    See real mermaid videos,mermaid video VISIT HERE http://realmermaidvideos.com/the-evolution-of-mermaids/

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