Construction Details:

The biggest challenge for Granmammare was deciding what her dress should look like. It changes in every scene. Sometimes, it's white, sometimes blue. Sometimes it has sleeves, sometimes it doesn't. I compromised by using the palest shimmery blue fabric I could find and making the sleeves sheer, so they're only half there. I also took the liberty of making the dress fitted, even though she usually appears somewhat shapeless during the film. When she pulls herself up onto the boat to kiss Fujimoto, she's a normal human size and quite shapely. That was enough justification to make a dress I felt good in. The second challenge was the jewelry. I knew I wanted to make her necklace from coral and pearls; I mean, she is the ocean goddess. But finding large chili pepper shaped coral was both difficult and expensive. Then I had to match the rest of the jewelry. The stone on the headdress is red turquoise (no, I didn't know such a thing existed either), and the earrings are an antique (read, EXPENSIVE) glass drop bead. The supplies for the jewelry cost over $100, but they all match perfectly and are beautiful. Totally worth it! Stringing everything up was the easiest part of the costume (I make jewelry on a regular basis). I rarely wear it, but I also made a wrap from tulle covered with beads, shells, glitter paint, and tiny felt Ponyo sisters. I reasoned that Granmammare never leaves the water, so she should take it to the convention with her. It was a bit of a pain to wear though, so it only made it out once. I also made Ponyo and Sosuke for my kids, as well as Fujimoto for my husband (that jacket sucked up 3 weeks of my life and was far more work than the rest of costume and the other 3 combined! Soooo much hand-sewing goes into a properly tailored jacket. I had NO idea until I started researching it!) Photos are by Bellavoce, Morataya, KenAD, and my husband (the ones without a watermark).

Styling Notes

This wig didn't take much styling-- just part the bangs and pin on the headdress. I did chose to sew about 50 small crystals into the fibers though, just to keep up the shimmery ocean goddess look. I like how they turned out-- subtle, but pretty.

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