[WIP] Road to Miku Expo, let's start !

Heya !
Long time no see, I'm sorry ! But I come back with a lot of fresh WIP ! Let's get started :)

If you're a vocaloid fan, you may know that Miku Expo is returning to Europe and more precisely, is coming back to Paris ! Of course, I had to buy tickets for the event. You may also have seen this poster for an event in China.

Miku With You 2019 official artwork made by 织布机loom

I instantly fell in love with the design. When I was a little girl, I've tried ballet but I wasn't very good (I achieve to repeat a year) but I absolutly love the aesthetic around that sport.

So after ordering my tickets for the Miku Expo in Paris, I started asking myself "What will I wear for this event ?" and this artwork came back to me. So I took a bunch of lycra and started this costume this friday.

Firstly, I look a lot the model. A ballerina dress with 2 black bow at her waist and a big one in her back with two long piece of fabric. A high knee sock, two hair deco and a crown of flower. During my research work, I was lucky enough to find this on my instagram wall : link to the post. A figure is in developpement and some photos were published. It helped me realised that there's two black bow and not only one. In addition, the back is perfectly visible and let me know that the bow in the back isn't white but blue !

For the skirt, I'm still in doubt. On the figure below, the smallest skirt is made with the same fabric as the bracers but on the real size figure made by the organisator, the made a plain skirt in lycra. I think if I've a sufficient amount of fabric on my coupon I'll go for the transparent fabric and if not, I'll go on the plain option !

After that, it was time to research some tutorial to help me get this dress done. Both tutorial I found are written in french but if you're interest to check them, here's the link. For the top part, I search for empire dress and found this tutorial and for the skirt part, I already knew it was a skater skirt so I found this tutorial and they help me a lot.

So I started by the skirt. You're going to see it but I make a mistake while cutting my skirt. The tutorial said "fold your fabric in two then in two" and I just read the first part of the sentence. So yeah, my waist was too short and I had to cut two piece for the skirt. For my measurement, the waist is 26cm * 2 (I don't remember why I've chosen this) and the skirt length is 50cm (48cm + 2cm for the hem).

Cutting the skirt. On left, my hole fabric lay down on the floor waiting to be cut. On the middle upper part, on skirt is already cut and is the pattern for the other side to be cut. On middle down part, the first skirt ready to be cut with all pin in place. And finally, on the right, my first mark for the first skirt

Then, I cut the bust measurement with the tutorial dimension as the same size as the creator of this tutorial. I cut the same piece twice as the white lycra is see through. I hadn't a sufficient amount of fabric to cut twice the skirt so I return to the fabric store and bought 1.30cm to be able to double the skirt too.

Bust draw on fabric ready to be cut

You see a bit the difference between the bust who is doubled and the bust who isn't on this picture.

On the left, the bust isn't doubled, you can see my shirt underneath. On the right, the bust is doubled

To resize the skirt, I measured the current waist of the skirt and calculte how much I had to cut on both side. If I remember right, I had to take off 5cm on both side. On saturday, I manage to cut the needed part of the skirt at I resized the bust part. It was too large for me, espescially under my boobs. So I measured how much I had to retire and pinned everthing and tested it.
What a f*cking mistake : one of the pin decided to sink into my skin, it was so painful x_x I even had to check if I didn't bleed on the fabric ! Luckily, It fit me perfectly. So I sew it and retest it with the skirt and without my shirt and pant underneath !

On the left, the pin tells me where to sew to resize the skirt. On the right, the bust is resized with pins

I couldn't work a lot of on this costume after that. So yesterday, I've just made the braces and the hair decorations. The braces were easy : two bands of 55cm by 4cm, I fold twice and sew in the middle. Not my cleanest work but it won't be that visible due to the massive Miku hair.

Braces WIP photos. I've tried to process the left photo to make the mark clearer, this is the black dots.

And those hair decoration. I realized just before cutting my fabric that it circled the entire ponytail.

The image of the figure that help me realized that

A bit perfectionniste, I decided that it would be cool to make the same thing. I tried to reuse the upper part that I left when I've cut the skirt (you know, the little half circle). It was a mistake and after 1 hour to try with those tiny piece of fabric, I decided to gathered some fabric to make them. I spend a lot of time on them as when I was sewing, the ruffles always wanted to say good bye and even after I sew them, they can still move a bit along the sewing line (I sew twice to make them more stuck in their position but nah, some part still move).

All my different trials on those decorations

And finally, I made a final test with the wig on to see the result for the moment and I can't hide it : I love this costume and I can't wait to finish it !

As you can see, I hadn't sew the braces on as I need to hem the top before adding them. And as my parents will come this weekend and bring with them my dummy, it will be easier for me to sew them correctly with it.

What's left on this costume to finish it ?

• Add the skirt on the dress
• create the transparent bracers
• add the bust decoration
• sew the braces in place
• add something to be sure that the hair deco wouldn't fall on the ground
• create the flower crown
• create the collar
• create the bows (black & white)
• find a way to make the big fabric pieces in the back not fall too much (I won't have them for sure for Miku Expo as I don't want them to get dirty)
• wait Christmas to get a new Miku wig, the black petticoat and the ballerina shoes !

What do you think about what I made this weekend ? :) See you probably in two weeks as I'll get the transparent fabric next week (but I won't be able to sew next week as I go on weekend with my family ;)).