Finn Amygdalitsis

Personal designs and construction of personifications of the Earth, the moon and the sun.
The Moon, based off of the Japanese Ainu tribe.
Cotton, suede, sheer fabric, beads, cork, gold foil, body paint.
Unfortunately, all of my process photos were lost for my Moon, Sun and Earth project due to a computer crash. These are some behind-the-scenes photos from the photoshoot, where I will still explain my process of making this costume with the captions.
I bought all materials used to make this costume.

Reference and inspiration for Moon. North Asian facial tattoos that sparked some ideas for the face makeup of Moon.

Reference and inspiration for Moon. An Ainu woman in traditional garments.

Reference and inspiration for Moon. This Ainu family helped me develop my ideas on the colours I would use for Moon's costume.

Reference and inspiration for Moon. The pattern of the woman's dress sparked some ideas for what patterns I would look for for Moon's dress.

Reference and inspiration for Moon. The wide waistband on these dresses solidified my ideas of giving Moon's costume a wide waistband.

Reference and inspiration for Moon. This traditional Japanese men's attire inspired me to give Moon's costume the large sleeves with the pointed shoulders.

Reference and inspiration for Moon.

Original concept for Moon character

1. I bought the dress for Moon, finding a pattern and colour that matched the ideas of my design. To construct the sleeves, I found two white curtains at a charity shop and hand-sewed them into the two sleeves. For the shoulders of the sleeves, I used a silver suede fabric which I sewed to the opening of the long sleeves. To make the pointed structure of the shoulders firm, I sewed wire into the peak of the shoulder. To connect the sleeves into one removable piece, I cut a long rectangle of the suede and sewed it to both ends of the shoulders, so the fabric stretched across the shoulder blades horizontally. For the final details of the sleeves I sewed embroidery moon appliques to the front of the shoulders and tassels to the end peak of the shoulders.

2. I found a white tablecloth with a lace design at the edges which I used as the waistband. For this, I sewed snaps to the inside of the fabric to the measurements of my model's waist, which would clasp snugly around the front of the waist. The center piece of fabric from the waistcoat was made from white suede and I sewed it to the back fold of the waistband. I bound the waistband with a gold foil ribbon.

3. To make the headdress, I used a simple wide white plastic headband as the base. Cutting a sheet of cork, I created the shapes I would use to design the headdress. I coated these cut cork pieces with clear modge podge to give the cork a smoother surface to prepare it for the paint. After the modge podge had dried, I painted silver paint onto the pieces and added blue highlights to them. This gave the cork a rough metallic look. I glued these pieces to the headband, placing the smaller triangles, like rays, at the back of the headband and the East Asian design at the front. I covered the glued spots with faux flowers, which added another pop of pastel colour to the costume. The ends of the cork headdress were topped with pink crystals and blue metallic pins, giving a detailed and radiant effect.

4. With Moon's makeup, I wanted to use silver and gold to give a shine to my model's face. The two silver streaks on the cheeks imitate the moon's reflection in water, with the pearls acting like the brightness of the moon's face.