Making the Costume... The Top Piece

After designing and sketching my costume that I intended to reflect an ice and rose theme, I began to bring the costume to life, starting with the top piece, which I had initially planned to create with gelatine, liquid latex and hot glue.

 The top piece

I purchased a female hanging mannequin and used this as my template to work from. I started by melting a gelatine and glycerine mixture in the microwave for 15-20 seconds and used the end of a paintbrush to pick up small amount of the melted gelatine and drizzled it in different directions over the entire mannequin body.

I continued to melt small amount of gelatine and use the same technique to drizzle it over the mannequin until the desired shape was created. I ensured to use more gelatine to cover the breast area so fewer gaps could be seen.

 

Once I was happy with the amount of gelatine I had applied, I then used the same sporadic drizzling motion to apply hot glue directly from my gun. I moved the gun quickly and in different directions, covering the gelatine. I decided to use hot glue over the gelatine as I think the glue looks more like ice in colour and texture when dry against the slightly yellow tone of the gelatine.

Once the hot glue had dried, I really liked the effect of the gelatine and hot glue combined and thought an icy effect was already created without using liquid latex to add more texture so I opted to not use it.

 

I then ensured that the hot glue was stuck securely to the gelatine by applying pva glue over the entire top piece. When I had previously carried out a practise test of combining the two materials, I noticed that the hot glue came away from the gelatine it was applied to when peeled off of the mannequin, so applying pva glue added the extra strength it needed. I also added silver glitter to the pva glue to add an extra effect and sparkle, which immediately made the piece look wintery and icy.

While the pva glue was still tacky, I sprinkled artificial snow over the entire piece and lightly pressed it into the glue. I then added further detail to the piece by sticking broken pieces of glass and diamantes onto it.

 

I then made another two gelatine pieces to fit onto the shoulders using the same drizzling method. Once the gelatine was dry, I used hot glue to attach my d.i.y icicles onto the small gelatine pieces. When they had adhered, I attached the pieces to the shoulders of the top piece I had made and added the same ice effects (hot glue, pva glue, glitter, artificial snow and glass and diamantes) to merge the pieces together with the top piece. 

 

 

I plan to adhere this piece of the costume onto the body using pro-aide, as it is a very strong glue. I plan to apply the flue to the shoulders, on the front of the neck and around the edge of the design as I did not want to apply too much glue to my model. I am hopeful that pros-aide will be strong enough to hold the piece on!