ama! Alex, 24, born in Florida and now in NYC, customer support worker w a degree in scociology, media and communications. I've been sewing and cosplaying nearly 10 years and I really love fandom history. ASK ME BIZ
the two i want first are my homestuck tattoo (the silver spirograph from the last panel, on the back of my neck) and possibly a ruler tattoo on my finger! i also have a typography tattoo with fuckin. fall out boy lyrics that I've been toying with getting on my inner left arm but I need to style it right and i've just never sat down to do it
honestly ive just NEVER had the money bc cosplay sucks up all my extra expense money. but now that my paycheck is significantly higher I def wanna try for next year
eminamazing I used to sew a little bit when I was a kid-my mom is pretty good at it, and she used to make me costumes when I was young. She had this policy for my birthday parties as a kid that if I only invited 9 other kids (plus me), she'd make a themed costume for every kid
so like once I had a mermaid party and she made every kid a tail in their favorite color to wear in the pool! or like one year was a powerpuff girls one so she had me get everyone's favorite character and made them an outfit
so I started when I was p young just for like, repairs mostly? and then when I started getting into cosplay, I spent the first like 2-3 years buying my costumes and sewing like, small accessories
and then eventually I wanted to create my own piece and... I think I started seriously sewing garments back in homestuck. I guess about 5 years ago now
tbh my best advice is to use friggin patterns. sewing is so much easier if you use a pattern. if you can't find a commercial pattern or find them too expensive, my preferred starting point is just... go to a thrift store. find a t-shirt, a button-up, and a pair of pants that fit you in a way you would like to replicate.
honestly I wish I was better at it but I've been kind of a start-stop with my progress, because cosplay costs a lot of money which I haven't had a lot of in the last couple years
the very first worldcon in 1939 in New York City is the first recorded instance. it was a man and a woman whose names I dont remember off the top of my head but the guy made an original scifi costume and the girl recreated a dress from a movie called Things To Come. It was the first documented instance of fan costuming at a show!
not to mention all Japanese cosplay structure is based from the 1950's Costuming Association Guidelines and there was some evolution there but. we did it first lol
I got to meet the guy who was the first president of the Costumers Guild, who established all modern day guidelines for cosplay, contests, and basically gave structure to EVERYTHING once and it was amazing
get a tattooeyes emoji