Halloween Special: The Cosby Show, Olivia's clown oufit is bright and scary!

In honor of Halloween coming up, I am taking three tired, overused costume concepts and doing a little experimenting to try an make them fashionable.

The first is the clown outfit.  I remember on "The Cosby Show,"  they put Olivia in these strange "clown outfits."  Granted, adding her character to the show was a mistake, but why did they dress her so strangely in her early appearances?

So my re-working involved lengths of shirring to make all the fabric gather into the waistline while hopefully not making Leonora look fat.  This fabric is majorly thin.  If it mere more lightweight, it would be see through, and it still added a lot of bulk.  Maybe I gathered too much in, but I still think the look is kind of interesting, even if it is not necessarily my favorite thing I have ever made..

Halloween Special: The Cosby Show, Olivia's clown oufit is too bright and scary!

In honor of Halloween coming up, I am taking three tired, overused costume concepts and doing a little experimenting to try an make them fashionable.

The first is the clown outfit.  I remember on "The Cosby Show,"  they put Olivia in these strange "clown outfits."  Granted, adding her character to the show was a mistake, but why did they dress her so strangely in her early appearances?

So my re-working involved lengths of shirring to make all the fabric gather into the waistline while hopefully not making Leonora look fat.  This fabric is majorly thin.  If it mere more lightweight, it would be see through, and it still added a lot of bulk.  Maybe I gathered too much in, but I still think the look is kind of interesting, even if it is not necessarily my favorite thing I have ever made..

"The Double Agent" - Vintage Futuristic Military

On the classic military shows that featured a mainly male cast, there seemed to be the regular occurrence of a beautiful female with an accent that secretly was on the side of the "good guys." Because, after all, if you are pretty, you have to be one of the goodies, right?

First of all, I love the pants, but the rest, I'm not thrilled with. I went through three different tops before deciding to use a simple blouse that I made for a previous outfit to make the pants stand on their own.

These pants and their chicken leg effect would have been absolutely disgusting to see a few years ago, but the "small on the bottom, big on the top" is in, and for some reason, as long as you pair this type of pant with boots, it is visually appealing today and I love the unusual look.

And as a fun extra, anyone who can tell me what other gun-wielder this outfit (the all brown version) is greatly inspired by gets huge bonus points!

"The Double Agent" - Vintage Futuristic Military

On the classic military shows that featured a mainly male cast, there seemed to be the regular occurrence of a beautiful female with an accent that secretly was on the side of the "good guys." Because, after all, if you are pretty, you have to be one of the goodies, right?

First of all, I love the pants, but the rest, I'm not thrilled with. I went through three different tops before deciding to use a simple blouse that I made for a previous outfit to make the pants stand on their own.

These pants and their chicken leg effect would have been absolutely disgusting to see a few years ago, but the "small on the bottom, big on the top" is in, and for some reason, as long as you pair this type of pant with boots, it is visually appealing today and I love the unusual look.

And as a fun extra, anyone who can tell me what other gun-wielder this outfit (the all brown version) is greatly inspired by gets huge bonus points!

Wild Wild West: Bridal Punk

So, I settled the argument between the two models by letting Raine play Angie, but making a dress for Leonora first.

I remember in the opening of "The Wild Wild West," the part where the cartoon saloon girl gets punched out by the cowboy.  Punching a woman?!  That's so wrong!  But for some reason it also tickled me seeing her fall on her ass each time.

The concept of this dress is crossing an Old West look with Punk.  Leonora was engaged to a cowboy, but he left her, so she cut up a pair of his jeans and one of his shirts and turned it into a brothel jacket, took his underwear and made a top out of it, and used the white bedsheets that she got as a shower gift and turned it into a billowy skirt.  Then, she went out drinking all night.

I kind of hoped I would end up liking this one a lot.  I'm not used to making dresses made out of huge amounts of draped and folded fabric, but I figured, what the hell, I'm up for trying something unfamiliar.  For the mock up, I ingeniously used a miniature dressform to figure out how to create a bustle skirt with a curved drape front out of one piece of material with a straight hem like they did back in the 1870's.  Once I figured it out, (it ends up looking kind of like a speed bump with spikes on the side) it was actually not as complicated as I thought it would be, but I sure am glad that I was able to make a few miniature versions first while perfecting the technique!

The jacket, I think it's a cool concept, but I could have made it look more, "dirty."  It's far too clean and finished to be punk.  Not finishing seams and being sloppy may sound easier to do in theory, but I guess not for me!  It was a good exercise in playing with sleeve cap volume, though.  I already have an idea on how to improve in this technique for a future avant garde outfit.




In the end, I think that this turned out to be a great excuse to discover a few new techniques in photoshop.  And my sexy-tough girl Nora plays a Fierce jilted bride, doesn't she?

Angie: 1940's+1980's= 2020's? The World May Not Be Ready.

I LOVED the show, "Angie."  I know I usually start with the lead character, but Raine and Nora are fighting over who gets to play Angie.  Nora says she looks better in the red hair, and Raine says she'd do a better job wearing the clothes.  Guess who won.

On a quick sidenote, can I just say how AWESOME the theme song is to this show?  If you haven't watched the video I posted, please do so now.  It's my favorite TV opening theme song next to Love, American style.  I think I have a thing for song containing background singers that Ooh and Aah in an ascending scale, which is another reason why I can listen to "Could it be Magic" for hours on end.  Can anyone think of other songs that do this?  Let me know!

So, with the other two models fighting, Trina was more than ready to step into the fashionable shoes of uptight Joyce, played be the delightfully upright Sharon Spelman.

Joyce was very proper and often wore big, slanted hats and long pencil skirts, very 40's, so I decided to try to mix the 40's with the 80's and came up with something that is interesting, but I think I forgot to add in "the 2010's," because it kind of looks too 40's and 80's!

Still there are lessons to be learned and there are some cool things about this.  I've been waiting to use this fabric.  It reminds me of chocolate mint ice cream.  And I continue to perfect my shoulder pad techniques.  Yes, shoulder pads are back in, thank you Lady Gaga.  But unlike the 80's, the pads now start further out and go up to a point, as opposed to starting close to the neck and covering the entire shoulder.  So there should be no fear of the football player look coming back...

Taxi: Simka and The Price Of Tea In China

I'm trying out a new style: Boho Punk!

Simca on Taxi, was a freak.  That is what made her adorable.  She was foreign (from a "European Country" that they never specified), didn't have a lot of money, wasn't always that intelligent, and also wasn't always that nice. Bohemian Punk!

I built everything off of this unusual skirt.  It's a tiered gathered skirt (Boho) held together with zippers that are open in areas, giving it an unkempt, jagged industrial look (Punk).  I also did a treatment that gives some panels a permanently wrinkled look by scrunching the fabric and pressing it on top of iron-on interfacing, so the wrinkles will never release.  The skirt is terribly impractical and would probably scrape your legs up, but I think it looks very cool.

And much like a European story, the rest of the tale is not such a happy one.  I made a gathered crop top to use as an undershirt for a Boho Punk jacket, but the jacket turned out too clean, which is what I am used to making.  I put on exposed zippers for the pockets and made the collar normal-sized on one side and large on the other, and even added a bullet-holder thing on the shoulder, but it still looked too flat!  Maybe a different fabric choice would have been the key, but I knew I liked the blouse underneath, so I removed the jacket and went with a new concept.

I took the top and added long kimono sleeves appropriate for the very sheer fabric.  I like this better.  It's dramatic even though it is soft and flowy, the amount of exposure adds a hard edge that goes along with the hard/softness of the skirt.

Taxi: Simka and The Price Of Tea In China

I'm trying out a new style: Boho Punk!

Simca on Taxi, was a freak.  That is what made her adorable.  She was foreign (from a "European Country" that they never specified), didn't have a lot of money, wasn't always that intelligent, and also wasn't always that nice. Bohemian Punk!

I built everything off of this unusual skirt.  It's a tiered gathered skirt (Boho) held together with zippers that are open in areas, giving it an unkempt, jagged industrial look (Punk).  I also did a treatment that gives some panels a permanently wrinkled look by scrunching the fabric and pressing it on top of iron-on interfacing, so the wrinkles will never release.  The skirt is terribly impractical and would probably scrape your legs up, but I think it looks very cool.

And much like a European story, the rest of the tale is not such a happy one.  I made a gathered crop top to use as an undershirt for a Boho Punk jacket, but the jacket turned out too clean, which is what I am used to making.  I put on exposed zippers for the pockets and made the collar normal-sized on one side and large on the other, and even added a bullet-holder thing on the shoulder, but it still looked too flat!  Maybe a different fabric choice would have been the key, but I knew I liked the blouse underneath, so I removed the jacket and went with a new concept.

I took the top and added long kimono sleeves appropriate for the very sheer fabric.  I like this better.  It's dramatic even though it is soft and flowy, the amount of exposure adds a hard edge that goes along with the hard/softness of the skirt.

Square Pegs: Around the Corner

It would probably be overdramatic to tell you how I agonized and agonized over this outfit.  I made three different tops before settling on this one.  The others were either too old lady, too unflattering, to just too wrong.  This cardigan-like sweater is a little on the simple side, but I actually can see a high school/college age girl wearing it.

The reason why I had such a hard time was that I started with the fabric with no TV inspiration!  I was totally lost before I noticed the squares in the pattern and the pegged pants.  Square Pegs!  That's it!  There's no particular character this would fit.  It's not dorky enough for the nerdy girls and not uppity enough for Muffy.  So let's just say that Trina would be playing an extra on the show.

Speaking of Trina.  Raine is quite upset right now because Trina is using her body.  Well, namely her torso.  I needed a pose that was a little less upright to make the look work.

Square Pegs: Around the Corner

It would probably be overdramatic to tell you how I agonized and agonized over this outfit.  I made three different tops before settling on this one.  The others were either too old lady, too unflattering, to just too wrong.  This cardigan-like sweater is a little on the simple side, but I actually can see a high school/college age girl wearing it.

The reason why I had such a hard time was that I started with the fabric with no TV inspiration!  I was totally lost before I noticed the squares in the pattern and the pegged pants.  Square Pegs!  That's it!  There's no particular character this would fit.  It's not dorky enough for the nerdy girls and not uppity enough for Muffy.  So let's just say that Trina would be playing an extra on the show.

Speaking of Trina.  Raine is quite upset right now because Trina is using her body.  Well, namely her torso.  I needed a pose that was a little less upright to make the look work.

The Addams Family: "Morticia, have I made you very Unhappy?" "Oh, yes, My Darling, Completely."

Part two of my mini-collection of darkness is Morticia Addams.  This suit is one of the main reinforcements of why I don't like to design in black.  This is the most complicated jacket that I have ever drafted.  It has three collars going all different directions, one and a half peplums, tiny pinstripes angled every which way, and hard-to-make sharp-cornered seams.  And you can barely see any of the work!  The unfortunate outcome is that Tish looks like a dominatrix 50's airline stewardess.

In the end, I kind of knew that I wasn't going to like this one.  After all, it's not really my style, but I really wanted to do a black collection so I could get over it and "come out of the darkness and back into the light."  Corny, yes?  But whatever!  You don't know me!

But for those of you who want to know, "What was he thinking?!" I can point a few cool things out.  First of all, I do know that the original Morticia costumes, both the Carolyn and Angelica versions, put the actresses in dresses so tight at the knees they could barely walk.  Making a fishtail gown, though, would be too obvious, so I started by making very tight pants with huge flares at the bottom with a corset at the top.  Then I realized that flared pants are SO not in style anymore, so I scrapped it and started over by making an uncomfortably tight jacket with padded shoulders and a strange, spider-like collar treatment with an attached choker that makes her decollete' look like a heart.

I even made a pair of impossibly tight ankle pants as an option to try and make it look less stewardessy.  I like the pants, but I think I'll leave the jacket/tight pants combo to another designer who likes to use black and make similar combo outfits.

So this was a good excercise, but soon will be put into the phail file!  I should have taken a picture of what a mess my sewing room was after all this.  Black fabric trimmings all over the place makes it look really creepy!