Construction Details:

This costume took about 70-80 hours of work, most of it for the embellishment. There are 96 appliques in 6 sizes, ranging from about 3" to 5.5". Many of them were handpainted with flower, foliage, and water designs. And all of them were satin stitched around the edges with gold metallic thread; the stitching took close to 6 whole spools (around 1,200-1,250 yards) of gold thread! The handpainting and cutting probably took 15-20 hours and stitching the appliques was another 30 hours.

I went in more of a fantasy direction than a real kimono with my interpretation since the reference already had a mix of male and female kimono elements rather than looking like something that actually exists (like having women's furisode length sleeves but being tied with a narrower men's obi). I made the tops and skirts separately, with the skirts being based on a half circle skirt. (Yeah, I was somewhat inspired by huge Clamp kimonos ^_^;) The separate tops and skirts made it much easier to get dressed since I have no experience in how to properly put on a real kimono. ^_^;;

The costume is based on this picture from the Petshop of Horrors artbook.

Personal Thoughts:

I've wanted to make this D costume ever since I saw the picture in the artbook over 3 years ago. *_* I was excited to finally do it and pleased with how it came out. Considering that I'd only done applique a couple of times in the past and never this extensively, I think the embellishment came out very well and I feel much more confident in my ability to applique. I'd kind of put off this costume for so long because I wasn't sure if I could decently stitch such complex appliques. >_>;

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