Queen Amidala Black Feathers Travel Gown

MY ULTIMATE PROJECT: QUEEN AMIDALA BLACK TRAVEL GOWN

Currently, I'm planning to do the gown worn by Sabe, Queen Amidala's decoy; when they escape from Naboo. Through observations made of pictures of the actual gown, fellow fans gowns and even the doll, I had roughly drawn out the basic design for the gown. Here is how I think it look like:

THE INNER GOWN

In order to create something that will not go to waste in REAL LIFE, I had the inner gown designed to look like a wedding or ball gown. Here is the basic sketch I did of it. The design was inspired by a wedding gown I saw in a local magazine.

I'm using Golden colored Silky Satin or Bridal Satin, which can endure extensive beading or rhinestone ironing on.

THE LACE COVERINGS

There are many ways to do this lace covering. There are the methods I can think of:

Do it as how they did for the actually one but it will be quite hectic.
Knit the lace (like knitted sweaters) and wear it over the inner gown.
Sew beads onto the cut golden cloth before or after having them sew into the inner gown. *
Iron on Iron-On Rhinestones. Quite expansive as 1000 stones cost SG$45.*
Sew knitted "ropes" on the cut cloth too.
Draw the black lines onto the golden cloth to get one that looks like the portrait doll version.
Use the cloth similar to the one used for the doll (the lines looks like crack lines) .
Use ordinary vine pattern lace with some small holes cut to allow more view of the golden cloth beneath it.
Curtain with vines or symmetrical (triangles, squares, rectangles etc) patterns, cut some holes and spray it with black cloth paint before sew into a vest and skirt to go over the inner gown.

About using a golden cloth with black design or vice versa, I may not recommend unless the design is really good and undefined. Flowers and squares are not recommended but if you are desperate and willing to spend the money, go ahead.

THE OUTER COAT

With the released of POTF Queen Amidala: Royal Decoy; I've found out how the outer coat really looks like. It seems that the gown is meant to be representative of a bird. The coat is layered with layers upon layers of triangular like panels of velvet, like the celebration gown.

What I'm going to do is to have the base coat done out of velvet. A gold like fabric is sew onto the back below the waist onwards.

Then, creating 3 different sizes of triangular like shape, I will cut out about 100++ panels each shape out of a heavier type of velvet. Each panel sides are then finished before being hand sew individually onto the base coat, starting from the bottom upwards.

As for the gold Amidala symbol on the lower part of the coat, I had choose to hand created it with gold thread as a soft cardboard in between the thread and the velvet to ensure I stick to the symbol shape entirely.

THE HEADDRESS

A base for the head is created using Rigid Wrap and Wire Mess. The wire mess is first shaped on my head as tight as possible and then placed onto a Mannequin head. Layers upon layers of Rigid Wrap are then placed onto the wire mess, with it being sandwiched between the rigid wrap.

Another base for the feathers is also created using wire mess and it is wired onto the headgear base. Layers, upon layers of feathers are then glued onto the base. Good single feathers are glued onto the top most layer of the feather layers.

Velvet is then wrap around the headgear.

2 egg half shape which had been painted red and given golden lines and some rhinestones are then wired onto the sides of the headgear.

MISC.

For the head jewel, I used a red crystal necklace (SG$21/-) which was tapped onto the cap I wore under the headgear.

The face paint is something I bought from a costume shop here and its color is IVORY WHITE, as used in the real film. A kabuki like face paint can also be used but be sure to make the color ivory as clown white will make the eyes look red. When applying the face paint, use a soft brush to do it, like how person doing kabuki (or geisha) will do it. Check out video of geisha from Japan if you got the chance. And one more thing, if your neck is expose, lightly paint the face paint onto the neck area too, although be sure that it's only lightly white, like when you apply thick talcum powder.

A fluffy short petite coat is wore underneath the inner gown to create the fluffed up look of the gown. A black Pantyhose & Black Medium height heeled shoes are also wore.

This picture I got from a Queen Amidala site had also been very useful as it "outline" out the spiderweb lace found on the gown. If you want to see the original gown nearer, check out here or just see this one in smaller scale. Other pictures I got are 1 2 3 .

You can also check out the following pages for the pictures of fellow fans who had "successfully" made the Black Feather Spiderweb Gown. ( 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 ).

Or check out the Portrait Doll Gown for inspirations ( Official / Boxed / Front / Back / Side-Right / Side-Left )

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