Sunday, October 20, 2013

Ada Lovelace: Finished Product

I finished this project back in late July, but right afterwards life geared back up again for school. This afternoon I find myself with some free time, so here are the last of the construction photos and some of the finished product.

Finishing the Wig

Bonnie Figured out that we needed support for the side rolls
Like this!

hair wrapped around the rolls
Finished with comb, veil, and flowers
adding lace to the vaeil


I had to cut the lace in parts to handle the curves

Lace attached to the wig/comb

I had to construct it in two pieces: one sewn directly to the wig, and the other sewn to the comb

attaching the underveil to the wig

Sleeves

I made a test version of the sleeves. The sleeves were just a rectangle of fabric cartridge pleated at the upper edge and gathered at the elbow. I supported the pleating with a strip of batting. 
Cartridge pleats marked & stitched

I trimmed the bottom edge of the pleats with some braided trim and added some leftover lace to the gathered elbow. 

finished bodice!



helper cat

Everything together on the dressform


Accessories

The gloves were a thrift store find. I sewed some trim from my grandmother's stash around the cuff. 

After doing some quick research on period shoes, I decided that ballet flats would be a close analog. I did take the sparkly bows off, though. 


 FINISHED!

I won best recreation at the Shore Leave 35 Costume Contest. It was the first contest I'd ever entered y myself. It was pretty great. The response to the costume was unexpectedly positive. Many women were thrilled to see Ada there to represent for female programmers.




3 comments:

Black Tulip said...

Fabulous! Love the picture of you recreating the pose in the portrait.

Miss Tungsten said...

This is amazing!
It's not exactly my favorite period, but the idea of an Ada Lovelace costume has been lurking in the back of my mind for a while now as well. Good job!
You should try to get a professional photoshoot to recreate the portrait as closely as possible :)

Sincerely,
another sewing computer scientist

Unknown said...

You are fantastic! It looks amazing. Great work!