Originally intended to document my experience of DeLorean ownership, focus is often radical and strange, boring and obtuse.

Monday, November 01, 2010

Bjork Swan Dress Costume

Bjork swan dress costume. Not for the faint of heart.
Halloween is arguably the best time of the year. There are so many reasons for its awesomeness that it cannot be summed up in a simple blog. Possibly a really complex blog posting would explain the awesomeness sufficiently, but I have very little time for that. During the month of October, I don't even have time to eat. I'm running on the last morsels of nutrients from my thanksgiving dinner.

This year I had two costumes; a work costume and one for my party. I began my main party costume in August. I've loved Bjork for as long as I can remember. My paraphernalia is extensive. It was time to complete it with some clothing.

It was time to cross-dress.

It was an obvious choice to go with the 2001 Academy Awards era Bjork. Yep, a home-made Bjork Swan Dress Halloween costume. And here's how I did it.

I picked up some sheer curtains ($15) at a thrift store, along with an $8 white skirt. I cut the sheers into strips, and sewed them onto the skirt in layers. I bought 3 white feather boas at Party Packagers for approximately $21. These were glued between the layers.

I bought a small bit of sexy satiny polyester ($6) for the swan's neck, and sewed that to the top of the dress. I stuffed it with about $2 worth of pillow stuffing and a piece of wire. I bent the wire into a U shape, that would go around my puny neck.

Making a sweet Bjork swan dress beak.
I bought $1.50 worth of orange and $1.50 worth of black Fun Foam at Michael's craft store. Using stupid, dull scissors (I need new scissors) I formed the orange piece into a funnel-like beakish sort of shape. It worked!



swan beak stuff.
The black nostrilly part of the swan was more difficult. And my crappy scissors didn't help. I cut a bizarre symmetrical shape out of the black Fun Foam to make this part. It doesn't look like it works, but it does!



swan beak bits.
I slid the wacky black shape into the orange beak and used my hot glue gun to hold them together. Note to people using hot glue guns - don't use the glue sparingly. Go nuts! The fun foam wanted to revert back into its natural flat shape, and tore. I had to glue this beak twice.



swan beak. Good for soup.
Finally, I used the hot glue gun to attach the completed beak to the head of the swan. It's a major visible component of the dress, so it had to look right. Once complete, I was very pleased with how it turned out.



The last items I needed were shoes and a wig. I bought the shoes at another thrift store for $7. They're not an exact match, but they're close enough that literally 99% of people who see me would never know. (I later found out that 50% of people who saw me didn't even know who I was! Eeep!)

I picked up a surprisingly accurate wig at Spirit Halloween for $16 sometime in mid-September. Total cost, about $78. It's worth every penny knowing you'll never find yourself face to face with another Swan Dress Bjork costume, fighting for prizes at some dope-ass party.

Fully assembled, I'd say I make a pretty sweet Bjork. Most people wouldn't. Most people would run away screaming. Which is exactly what Halloween is all about!

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