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
One party at Carnevale 2023 had the theme of “Once Upon a Time” and invited guests to come in any sort of fairy-tale costumes (but no Disney cosplay!). I looked through my closet and decided on something vaguely wicked stepmother-y using my black gothic fitted dress (which I wore twice that year at Carnevale, making
For a Carnevale afternoon tea with a mystical tarot theme, I dressed as the Queen of Swords, who symbolizes woman as widow, crone, and divorcée. Obviously, this card speaks to me, and I was excited to create all the layers of meaning. In the classic Rider-Waite tarot, the Queen of Swords is wearing a cloak
In an ongoing quest to figure out 18th-century men’s pants for me / Leonard, I started a new pair of breeches that were just going to be to test out the pattern but have developed into a whole new suit. I made umpteen mockups of the fall-front breeches from the original pattern by Eagle’s View
I got this length of fabric from Sarah ages ago and had dreamed of making something long, elegant, and flowy with it. Like a tea gown. So finally, in summer 2022, I went ahead and used the Laughing Moon Mercantile princess-line tea gown pattern with this fabric. There was just barely enough of the velvet,
Carnevale 2023 overlapped with Valentine’s Day, so one party combined both for a red / black / white and commedia dell’arte mashup. I did a broken-hearted twist mostly using things I already had in my costume closet, with some small additions. I used the big red coat from my Nadja costume, plus the dress from
The first event of Carnevale 2023 was a brunch, which called for fancy pajamas. I went for deshabille because I had these fun things to wear that hadn’t seen the light of day yet! Starting with a custom Victorian corset by Redthreaded, using a cotton stripe fabric I provided, then a ruffly black cotton robe and
The best party of Carnevale 2022 was Tricia’s Pirates and Mermaids Party on a historical ship that sailed around the lagoon all night! It was a super fun theme in a kick-ass location with awesome people. I didn’t know it would turn out so great, of course, when I was planning my costume, I was
This was not the Edwardian black-and-white stripe suit I planned for Carnevale 2022, but this was the one that turned out pretty damn good in the end. A year before, our group decided to take a walk in Edwardian costumes, preferably in black and white, during Carnevale. So I thought this would finally be the