This was my simplest and cheapest costume for Carnevale 2024! For the Pleasure Barge of Cleopatra, I made a Bastet outfit inspired by a Bastet statuette I’ve had forever. She has very tall, pointy ears, so I made those out of some stiff black fabric and interfacing. I bought a silver necklace and matching cuffs
Carevale 2024 was the year of last-minute costumes for me! I normally hate last-minute sewing and try to plan things out so I’m done well before the event or trip. And I was this year! But I also got new ideas about a month before leaving for Venice so… One of the events was “A Night
Sometime around Christmas before Carnevale 2024, I heard about a new costumed meetup, a Toybox Afternoon Tea at the Hotel Danieli. The theme was enchanted childhood and toys, which didn’t interest me at first. But then I was looking through my stash and saw this pink patchwork stuff (I think it was a bedspread?) that
When I heard about a Carnevale dance party with the theme of “Viva las Versailles in Venice,” I immediately thought I needed something shiny and bright. I’d always wanted to do some costume with cute, decorative exposed panniers, so I decided on a showgirl type costume with blinged-up panniers. I looked through AliExpress at rhinestone
I was hosting a small daytime party at Carnevale 2024 — it was a gaming salon with a “fancy loungewear” costume theme. Since I’d be running around as hostess, I needed a simple, practical outfit (but still fabulous ;). Luckily, I already had a custom-made “Carlotta” Spiderweb Robe from Nicoletta Carlone in purple that I’d ordered
The Bella Donna Historical Performers were invited to perform at Carnevale in Venice for the Boticelli’s Primavera Dinner. While I don’t sing with the group, I’m a supporting member and needed to dress the part. Alas, my old black and gold gown was in sorry shape, and the bodice no longer fit. Also, I’d always
At Carnevale in 2024, there was going to be a Purple Party — a dance party where guests were asked to wear something purple. Now I have a ton of purple in my everyday and costume wardrobes, plus I’ve been getting my (naturally almost black) hair dyed purple for several years. So I could have
This year’s Halloween costume was inspired by Sarah telling me I had to do this, and the ladies in Bella Donna doing a black-and-white movie theme for the 2014 PEERS Bal des Vampyres. Since my friends there would be in somewhat related costumes, I acquiesced to Sarah’s demand (which was based on my super-short, post-chemo
It’s easier than you might think Have you ever dreamed of waking up in a canopied bed, throwing open the curtains to look out over rolling green hills, then dressing in your finest period costume to stroll about those hills with your best friends? Do you fantasize about candlelit dinners in wood-paneled rooms with you
In case you haven’t noticed, I kinda like to combine books and costumes a bit. Also, books and costumes and movies. So over on Frock Flicks for National Book Month, I rounded up my top five and bottom five movies adapted from books, with an emphasis on costume. There’s some Jane Austen, natch, and a
It started, as most projects do these days, with a Pinterest board. Or maybe it started even before that with this room layout tool, mentioned in an Offbeat Home post. Because what’s more fun than screwing around with make-believe room diagrams where you can rearrange things to your heart’s content? Anyway, it all came down
Did you know Kendra wrote a book? My BFF Kendra wrote an awesome book about how to style 18th-century hair & wigs, chock full of historical research & documentation. It was ready for sale at Costume College 2014, so I wanted to help promote it. I decided to wear the wig I modeled for her
One of my first fandoms was Doctor Who, and Tom Baker is my One True Doctor. So when Loren suggested doing femme versions of the Doctors for Costume College 2014, oh yeah, I had to make it happen. Even better, I realized I could do it with stuff I already had or things I could
FROCK FLICKS! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, after an unexpectedly long hiatus, the one and only, original podcast snarking historical movie costumes is back! Now we have a blog, a Facebook page, Pinterest boards, and Twitter. Follow us everywhere, we enjoy that kind of stalkerazzi action. Over on Facebook, we’re particularly active in discussing what movies
When Costume College 2014 announced that the theme for the Friday Night Social was “Club Ice” & made allusions to bling, sparkle, diamonds, rhinestones, & the like, well, I took this as a personal challenge to wear something eye-blindingly sparkly. I went through a lot of options of what to make or buy & finally