Star Wars Crafting! Anything you've designed, built, sewn, created that has a Star Wars theme. Come and share your art!
Finally made the Flame Handmaiden Gown =D

Padmé Naberrie Cosplay by tehNakki 1st worn at Thought Bubble 2016
While I was on family leave for the month of October it finally occurred to me that I had never made the one costume I had wanted since I first saw it... and there was no real good reason not to make it right now.
My mom was kind enough to indulge me and let me use her backyard patio and trees for the dyeing and drying. I cut the pieces first, sewed together each sleeve, the top, the hood, and the skirt (in both velvet and linen) and then dyed each piece individually to get the ombre effect.
When I started researching this dress it turns out that there’s a kinda obsessively crazy star wars costuming circuit and after about an hour of perusing their forums I realised I did not care nor have the time to deal with their strict “rules” for the recreation of this dress, though I did heavily draw from the picture albums they’ve acquired to figure out exactly how I was going to put this together.
Because I’m incapable of leaving things alone, there’s a couple tweaks I’m going to make before bringing this to ECCC next year (re-dye the skirt so the orange ombre extends beyond the red sash, fix the pleating on the sash, press, stitch the hood so it falls better) but ugghhhhh I GET TO BE PADME. IT’S SO MUCH FUN =D And it’s everything little teenage girl me thought it would be when I saw it on screen in Phantom Menace!
Also, I MET GLYN DILLLON, CO-COSTUME DESIGNER OF ROGUE ONE while wearing this costume and had a total meltdown at him. So yeah.
(forgive the blurriness, I was shaking from excitement)
Fabric: White velvet (I ordered 5 yds but I really should have gotten 6, would have made it a lot easier) Linen (some shit I acquired at Joanns that was 70% off) Rite Dyes: i used the brightest orange, red, and yellow
Reference Docs: Flickr Album of w/closeups of one of the actual gowns Reference Pics Gallery from Movie A forum w/a couple of good flat pieces for reference Good explanation for how all the pieces go together




THIS IS AMAZING!! You did a beautiful job on this....I am especially impressed by your dedication to dyeing!
Was the dyeing difficult, especially on velvet? Was this your first time dyeing?
Aww thank you!
Yes this was my first time attempting to dye anything! I found it relatively easy. The dye took to the fabric really quickly and it's super colorfast, the rinse water stayed incredibly clear when i was rinsing inbetween dips.
The quality of the fabric really made a difference, I had originally planned to do a cheaper synthetic which would have required stovetop dyeing but the swatch i tried was such a pain in the butt that it was worth it to order the more expensive velvet online. Being able to just use hot water in buckets for the different colours instead of on the stovetop was soooo much easier. Really happy how it came out, though I think I will attempt to paint-dye some more orange onto the skirt.