Leopard Print Bedlah
This year I had a bit of a thing for leopard print. I found this gorgeous burnout stretch velvet in leopard print, but then when I hit a pause in the making of this costume, I decided to order another leopard print costume from Bella. But I ended up finishing this one anyway, and it’ll be for sale on my etsy store if it doesn’t sell through the swapmeet on bhuz.
The bra was created using a padded convertible bra as a base. I find the convertible bras are good to remake because they tend to hold their shape even when you change the strap configuration. I bought a pretty expensive one, thinking I would just cover the band in the stretch velvet fabric, but that didn’t work very well, so I had to chop it off at the side seams and add non-stretch buckram bands at the back, then cover those with the velvet. This created a solid, supportive foundation, but I now know I don’t need the expensive ones with the extra-good band! The shoulder straps are doubled grosgrain ribbon for strength, covered in a tube of the same print fabric. They are crossed at the back for support.
The belt is made from two layers of black drill fabric, one layer of the print velvet and a layer of shaping fabric. I used a belt base from Sugar Petals (the now don’t stock them anymore) for the front to give shape, and buckram in the back. I cut each piece, pinned, then machine sewed the four layers together, trimmed and turned them inside out so the velvet was on one side, a layer of drill underneath and on the back, with the buckram/shaping inside. The pieces were then ready to sew down at the edges, connect, then embellish.
For the embellishment I bought a pack of huge pearshaped Swarovski crystals in copper crystal and AB crystal, and used them for the main decoration, surrounded by beaded/sequinned settings. Then I added draped copper crystal swarovskis threaded into strings, for ultra bling-factor! I ran out of Egyptian glass fringe (I used overlaid 8″ and 4″ to give the multi-length effect) for the belt right before the end, so strung my own for the last 10cm. It’s an ever-so-slightly different copper colour, but only really visible in photos with a flash.
The skirt is a three-panel trumpet skirt with an elastic waist, with an added flare at the centre back for more swish.
