Thursday, February 11, 2016

Fan X 2016 Costume: Fawkes


So one of the things I love to do about this time is contemplate a new costume for Fan X. But usually it sneaks up on me, or I go with the easier option of reusing my Luna Lovegood costume. Now, while I love that costume, I also feel the need to try something new.  So. I'm going for Fawkes, from Harry Potter. I love the fandom, it's a great character, and it would be nice to have a second costume to fall back on that's totally different.  Although kind of in the same color scheme.  So obviously the first step was to do a few sketches about what was possible.
So just a note about designing a Fawkes costume.  Pulled from the Harry Potter wikipedia page of descriptions of Fawkes over the books:

"Fawkes has crimson feathers on his body and a golden tail as long as a peacock's. His claws and beak are gleaming gold and his eyes are black. The scarlet body feathers glow faintly in darkness, while the golden tail feathers are hot to the touch, though it is unknown if they are actually capable of burning someone as neither Harry — when Fawkes carried him from the Chamber of Secrets in 1993 — nor Dumbledore — when he escaped the Ministry officials with Fawkes's help in 1996 — were burned by his tail feather, however it is possible that Fawkes can control the temperature of his tail feathers and chose not to burn them."

A couple of things when designing a costume for a con/fan x.  It has to be comfortable.  Rule absolute number one.  If I'm not comfortable, at least to a bearable degree, I get cranky.  And cranky at a con is not fun.  Second thing is that it needs to be able to come apart, at least to a degree.  I use public transport when I go and while I'm mostly immune to sitting in costume, it helps if I can de-costume at least a little bit.  Plus, sometimes it's tiring to be in costume for that long.  Also, I usually go alone, or at least end up going off and doing my own panels and activities, so there's no one to hold a piece of my costume for bathroom/food/water breaks.  The costume needs to be relatively easy to maneuver around in and not poke anyone's eye out as I move through the floor.