Cosplay and Costumes
It started with Halloween…
When I was a little kiddo, Halloween was a high holiday around my house. Between the handmade costumes and haunted houses we hosted in our garage, it was a pretty big deal for us. I feel as though my origins as a Halloween lover fostered my love of cosplay later in life. I always loved dressing up during Halloween time but never thought to do it year round! The first year I attended C2E2 in Chicago was in 2018. I was a freshman in college and looking for a bit of community. I had recently changed my major from Fashion Merchandising to Animation and I wanted to see what other art nerds were up to. That first year was life-changing. I met so many cool people and artists and was introduced to the culture of cosplaying.
At C2E2 the following year, I told myself I wanted to go in cosplay. I had recently finished watching the first season of The Umbrella Academy and had a strong appreciation for the character Five Hargreeves. I took advantage of my short haircut and the fact that I already looked like a teenage boy in order to play the character properly. Using my current hairstyle and androgynous body type is a trend that would reappear in almost every cosplay that followed.
Fellow fans at the convention loved the look and plenty took photos with me. I can’t deny that as an introvert with a secret love of the spotlight, it was quite the ego boost. There was just something about being able to connect with other nerds on such a huge scale that sparked something inside of me.
In the following years, I would continue to create costumes with increasing levels of complexity of craftsmanship. I’ve learned something new in each build and hope to continue strengthening my database of knowledge and knowhow in the coming years.
Peek around this page to see some of the builds I’ve done so far!
2022
Star Wars
2022
Marvel
2024
Gravity Falls
2024
Project Hail Mary
2022
Marvel
2021
Marvel
2020
Moomin
2019
The Umbrella
Academy
Oh boy, was this one popular online! The folks of TikTok sure were not shy in admitting their love of it! Here’s hoping it’ll get a similar reaction at C2E2 this year!
The base triangle headpiece was constructed using cardboard, EVA foam and black felt. It was painted with yellow and black acrylics and gold glitter.
The eye lining and eyelashes were created out of air-dry clay, painted with black acrylics and sealed with a clear shine aerosol. The iris and “shine” are painted EVA foam. The white of the eye is several stacked layers of glitter mesh that were sewn to a wire armature and glued together with an aerosol glue. The wearer sees out of the headpiece through the white of the eye, with the bottom of the iris in the middle of their eyesight, rendering it nearly invisible.
The inside of the headpiece is cardboard that has been padded and lined with black felt.
The costume was created by tailoring clothing found at local thrift stores and by using things found in my closet.
The jacket was relined in yellow using a thrifted tablecloth. Fun fact, the tablecloth was used at a Thanksgiving dinner before becoming this jacket. The vest had a corset back sewn into it and had gold detailing added to the front. The shorts were tailored to fit and the shirt was untouched.
Bill Cipher
Headpiece & Costume
Completed November 2024
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Bill Cipher is the main antagonist of the 2012 animated show, Gravity Falls. I watched the show when it first came out and have loved it ever since. With the resurgence of popularity in the summer of 2024 when The Book of Bill was published, many people online took to their closets and dug out their hot glue guns. I had always loved the character and I went full obsession mode on the book and its accompanying website when it came out. So naturally I had to get my glue gun out too.
I had always wanted to cosplay as one of the many versions of “Human Bill” even back when the show was airing. But I was 12 when it aired… and didn’t know cosplay was a thing. So here I am, 12 years later, living out my pre-teen dreams. Now this wasn’t the exact design I had in mind and little me would probably clutching her tiny pearls at the sight of the finished outfit but she’d be proud nonetheless.
Click through to see how the process of putting this together!
First off! A big thank you to @ru_suski on TikTok for letting me use their costume as inspiration for mine!
Some "proof of concept" art
Trip to the thrift store! Found the vest, shorts and shirt all on the same day!
Prototype of the head! This was my second try. The first one was a little too big but this one fit just right! This base will go on to being the skeleton of the final headpiece!
"brick-laying" and getting scared by Netflix's movie recommendation!
Finished with EVA and modeling foam!
The head is now painted, "glittered" and ready for final touches! The white of the eye is mesh tulle that was sewn to a metal oval and sealed together with clear spray glue. It was actually pretty easy to see through!
Onto the costume part!
Adding on the glitter trim to the vest
First try-on before lining the jacket with the yellow table cloth
A look at the back of the vest. I hate tailoring to exact sizes so corsets are very popular in my costumes!
The final look! Lining the jacket took eons but it was sooo worth it!
Final look without the jacket!
Rocky & Grace
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This costume was made from a reused mechanics uniform, a tool belt and some plastic toy tools. It was a bit hard to think about how I could both “humanize” and “feminize” the small faceless rock alien that doesn’t even have a canon design (below is my artist’s rendition of how I imagined him). I decided that since he was the Blip A’s engineer, he would probably wear something like this! In the book, he has a tool belt and is always working on some piece of machinery. The fashion choices I made included wearing handmade “rock/asteroid” polymer clay earrings and wearing my hair in five mini ponytails as a callback to Rocky’s pentagonal shape. I created what I imagined Rocky’s mission crest to be and stuck that to my tool belt. Finally, as a reference to how Rocky only speaks in musical tones, I gave myself a fake neck tattoo of musical notes with sharpie!
My mom graciously came with me to C2E2 as Rocky’s friend, Ryland Grace. She wore an astronaut suit with the Project Hail Mary mission crest placed on the front. She also took an old water bottle and created an astrophage container out of it! She also wore a set of dangly Rocky earrings that I made from polymer clay.
Costumes & Props
Completed March 2024
Rocky is the second protagonist of Andy Weir’s 2021 sci-fi novel, Project Hail Mary. He is described as being roughly pentagon-shaped, the size of a Labrador and having a rock-like exoskeleton.
I read the book in late 2023 and fell so in love with the story and the characters that fan art and cosplays were bound to happen! It’s an excellent little book and I look forward to seeing how it will be adapted for the screen in the coming years!
C2E2 2024!
My music note neck "tattoo" as a reference to how Rocky only speaks in musical tones
My Rocky earrings! My mom wore these as part of her costume!
Making the Rocky earrings was so much fun but I was so nervous that they were going to break in the oven!
My first requested costume! Once my brother found out I was making costumes, he had to get in on that action!
This mask is made out of thin EVA foam, sunglass plastic and elastic. I was painted with metallic acrylics and finished with glossy sealing spray.
The chest piece and arm gauntlets were made from EVA foam and pieces of thin leather for embellishments and attachments. The chest piece is affixed to a black t-shirt while the arm gauntlets are glued to elbow-length gloves. The black cape, hood and waist-belt are made from a repurposed table cloth.
Darth Revan
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Mask & Armor
Completed 2022
Darth Revan is a Star Wars “Knights of the Old Republic” character who turned dark side during the Mandalorian Wars. He has a really cool character and mask design and I was just happy to be included in the crafting process.
My brother tells me it got a lot of compliments at the various comic conventions he went to!
Full fit being shown off at Fan Expo Chicago in 2022
A better look at the finished mask
The gauntlets and gloves still in progress
The chest piece before being put onto the shirt
the same table cloth material from the cape and hood were bunched up and sewn into the midsection of the chest piece
First time making a hood! :D
What the costume looks like on its own
They say imitation is the greatest form of flattery and oh boy, did I want to flatter that fictional character! A fairly easy but really effective cosplay that only consisted of a few key props. I found the grey suit at the thrift store for like…$5 which was an absolute steal and the shoes I already happened to own (keen-eyed viewers will recognize these shoes from both my Bill Cipher and Winter Soldier cosplays!). I opted for the screen-accurate sunglasses since I planned on wearing them frequently as a closet-cosplay thing.
The hardest part of this cosplay was probably the social/moral quandary of carrying a walking stick around with me. After consulting a few Reddit threads, the consensus was that it was ok if you A. didn’t buy a real one and B. only carried it around with you as not to confuse people. So I made my own collapsible stick out of some skinny PVC pipe and connectors and some electrical tape. I was able to take it apart when walking around the city and in transport and could easily put it together when I got to the con. I did have one or two event helpers ask me I needed assistance and I had to politely explain that it was a prop. But other than that, people really loved it and even recognized me the year later when I had a table at C2E2. They called me “Lady Daredevil”.
To add to the costume, I carried around fake business cards for “Nelson & Murdock Attorneys at Law” and gave them to every Spider-Man cosplayer I saw. On the backside of the business card, it had real information for my artist accounts!
Daredevil
Costume & Props
Completed 2022
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Matt Murdock AKA Daredevil, is a legally blind superhero in the Marvel universe who uses his heightened abilities to fight crime in Hell’s Kitchen, New York. I picked up on this character when I was in the Marvel phase of 2021-22.
I absolutely loved the creativity of the character and how unique his abilities were. The looks and charm of his character in the Netflix series, also helped the obsession I had with him during that time.
Click through and see how this cosplay was made!
It started with some fan art! I drew this at work one afternoon and went "uh-oh...I need to do this!"
And so it began! Went to the thrift store and found the perfect fit!
Spray painting PVC pip ending up being really difficult for me. I had to tape the pipes on the inside and sort of...dangle them off of something else. They had to be repainted a few times as they fell off once or twice.
Measuring them to be height accurate was tricky!
Shout out to Magnoli Clothiers for the glasses! They were shipped all the way from New Zealand!
The final look! A little smudge of red lipstick on the forehead was good enough of a "wound" for me! Pretty sure everyone knew who I was without that though!
Quite possibly my most popular cosplay! This one was a hit at the cons. The headpiece design was the first thing I designed entirely on my own. It’s made from various pieces of EVA foam, molding foam, felt and mesh. The main base is solid EVA foam while the outside of it is molding foam that had been scratched and scraped up to give the appearance of old bone. A Dremel was used to create this effect! More on how this headpiece was made can be found below!
The rest of the costume was inspired by the comic-book appearance of Khonshu when he wears an all white suit. Once again…thrift stores and pre-owned clothing made this happen! The hardest part of this fit was the suit coat. I searched and searched for a white suit coat that matched the vibe I was going for and the only one I found ended up being 3 sizes too big for me. So a lot of tailoring had to be done to get it to fit. But, what started as a huge challenge for me, ended up being one of my favorite costume alterations to date. The way I pleated the coat in the back, gives the effect of tail feathers, an appropriate detail for a bird-themed character!
Khonshu
Headpiece & Props
Completed 2022
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Khonshu is a secondary character and partial antagonist in the Marvel property of Moon Knight. He is based on the actual Egyptian mythological character, Khonsu, who is the god of the moon. In the show, he’s a big scary bird guy who follows around and terrorizes Oscar Isaac.
I felt like he had a cool character design and I wanted to try my hand and designing my own headpiece!
Click through to see how this cosplay came together!
It started with a butcher paper mock-up! Took a few tries but this was a really easy method for creating reusable pattern!
Completed paper design!
Cutting out the "beak" from a thick EVA foam
Finished base
Trying it on to make sure it fits! Eek!
Seeing how it looks before adding the paint
I mixed brown and black acrylic paints with some water to create and "aging" wash. It worked really well and made the cuts and gashes really stand out.
The black mesh in the eye and nose gave me a really hard time but we got it to stick!
A metal bar was added into the front of the beak because it was pressing on my cheeks to much.
Finished the mask!
Aaaand finished the staff! That was made from PVC pipe and EVA foam! It was painted with gold spray paint.
The tailored back of the jacket. A lot of magic had to be worked here! It was 3 sizes to big for me when I bought it!
The "tail feather" pleating in the back of the jacket. One of my favorite alterations!
I added cufflinks!
The full fit!
C2E2 2022
C2E2 2022 after finding some other Moon Knight cosplayers!
Fan Expo Chicago 2022
In early 2021, I fell bass-ackwards into the Marvel fandom world. Not sure how it happened really but I just really got into Sebastian Stan and The Winter Soldier and it all fell apart from there. At the time, I had short brown hair and a proclivity for sleeping in my eyeliner, both of which made me think I was the perfect candidate for a Winter Soldier cosplayer. That summer I got to work on what would be my first EVA foam prop. I bought the arm pattern off of XiengProd on Etsy and constructed it using various spray paints and sealants. The pattern had to be adjusted slightly since I got them long arms but it was a really well done template. I added a long evening glove spray painted silver underneath both of the arm pieces.
Most of this costume was constructed from existing pieces. The mask is from Zaklabs on Etsy, the jacket, knives and utility belt are al from Amazon. Things like the kneepads, prop gun and pants are from the thrift store. And clock the first appearance of my “cosplay boots”. As seen in other cosplays such as showgirl Bill Cipher and Daredevil.
Some of the props that I made myself in this piece are the two back pieces and the prop gun. You can get a better look at the back pieces in the slideshow below. They were both made out of EVA foam. The prop gun was made from a NERF gun that I painted black and added a PVC barrel onto.
The Winter Soldier
Costume & Props
Completed December 2021
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The Winter Soldier (AKA Bucky Barnes) is a character in the Marvel universe. He was originally a soldier for the US army and bestie to Steve Rogers (ahem Captain America). He was captured by Hydra during the war and brainwashed into The Winter Soldier. In universe, he has since been rehabilitated from his “programming”. Good for him and his mental health, bad for us who liked the long hair and mask.
Like I mentioned before, it was really my resemblance at the time that drew me to cosplaying as this guy…And also because I was obsessed with him. It was a fun cosplay experience for me. I did this cosplay in December of 2021 when the mask mandate was still in effect for COVID-19 so going as a character with a mask built in was actually super helpful! I got a lot of attention from a large number of Captain America cosplayers though, some of it was welcomed! Some! One of them was actually The Colorado Captain! He was very sweet and took a bunch of pictures with me.
See how this costume was made!
The morning that started it all! I looked in the mirror and went "oh god...wait a sec I can do something with this."
After I decided that I wanted to create a full Winter Soldier cosplay, I had to convince my friend, Katie, to go as my Captain America to C2E2 and used this as a visual aid. She said yes!
Laying out the arm pieces from the XienProd pattern I got from Etsy.
How the arm looked after contact cementing it together.
This is how the chrome spray paint looked after a few layers of plasti-dip and Worbla Flexbond. I designed the hand piece and glued it to the top of an elbow length evening glove.
The most stressful part of this whole build tbh. Painting the red star on the arm gave me so much unnecessary hell.
One afternoon while building this fit, I was driving around my neighborhood and found this near the trash on the side of a road. I picked it up and turned into Captain America's shield. Honestly I couldn't think of a more perfect piece to use it on! How appropriate, right?
The inner arm supports were made using discarded accordion leather pieces.
I killed my workout ball while making the front of the shield...dug that knife in a little too deep! But this method was one I found online that involved wrapping the shield in many layers of plastic wrap to a workout ball and then molding the piece to the ball with a heat gun. Worked out really well!
Progress of the shield
Captain America's back piece designed to hold the shield. Made from foam and again...used accordion leather pieces.
I designed the back piece for the Winter Soldier using very grainy set images I found online.
Here it is with the EVA foam.
And this is what it looked like completed!
Designing the knife holders in the back was also a hard task due to lack of reference photos.
A raw piece of EVA foam vs. one that I grinned and sanded the hell out of. Looking back, I'm sure there's an easier way to smooth out those pieces. Probably air-dry clay or EVA molding clay.
This is how the finished knife holster looked!
The goggles I ordered ended up messing with my hair too much so I ended up gluing them to a pair of old sunglasses that I had.
My very brightly colored NERF gun. I sanded down all the parts that said NERF and painted over them with Flexbond.
The gun was sprayed with about 3-4 layers of black Plasti-dip and that was really all it needed. The Plasti-dip is naturally matte so it made it look more realistic. I added on the longer barrel with a PVC pipe. It fit perfectly into the tip of the gun. And as per convention guidelines, I took orange ductape and wrapped it around the tip of the gun.
The jacket I ordered from Amazon needed some tailoring in the middle area. This was definitely meant for a man and so I took it in to fit my bod a little more.
And that's it! I got these boots from Amazon as well but they ended up being so painful, I only wore them for one day.
Katie and I at C2E2 in December of 2021!
This was a fairly easy costume to pull off! I made the flower crown around the hat and just assembled all the other pieces from the thrift store or online. To be on character, I learned how to play at least 2 songs on the harmonica I was carrying around with me. The crazy part about this particular year was that it was at the end of February in 2020! It was the last large scale event in the city before the whole world closed down!
I remember being on the bus to the event and talking to my mom on the phone saying “I wonder if anyone here is going to have that weird disease folks are talking about.” Oooooo little did we know. Two weeks after, I would be packing up my dorm and moving back home. It was my senior year so after that spring, I never saw most of my classmates or teachers again. That C2E2 and this costume hold a very odd place in my mind because of that. It was like there I was standing at the precipice of this huge world event, naive to what was to come…dressed as a garden gnome.
It was a fun time regardless of all that! Moomin had gained a small resurgence the year before when the new animated Moominvalley series came out so I found 3 or 4 other Snufkins walking around that year.
Snufkin
Costume
Completed 2020
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Snufkin is one of the main characters in the Moomin franchise. He is best friend to the titular character and general cool guy around Moominvalley. I accidentally got into Moomin in 2019 when I heard the song “Lemon Boy” by Cavetown. The lyric “Like Snufkin and Little My, we’ll get around wherever.” piqued my interest and down the rabbit hole I went!
See some of pics from C2E2 2020!
Me and my friend Dani (They were dressed as the dad from 'Honey, I Shrunk the Kids')
The one that started it all…
I, like many other folks in 2019, was totally encapsulated by the premier of The Umbrella Academy. I thought it was a really interesting story and had cool characters. I liked Five here the most because I have somewhat of a soft spot for the “go ahead, underestimate me.” character types. And like many of my other cosplays, I utilized my hair length! It’s not that hard to look like a 12 year old boy when you have a pixie cut.
I found everything I needed at the thrift store. I made the school emblem out of paper and safety pinned to my lapel. It was a pretty easy look to piece together. And boy, did it have huge payoff! I was VERY popular that year at C2E2. That popularity and connecting to the fandom community is what kept me cosplaying. I couldn’t believe that people were stopping to take photos and yap with ME! I was so hooked from that point on.
Five Hargreeves
Costume
Completed 2019
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Five Hargreeves (AKA Number Five) is one of the 7 superpowered siblings in The Umbrella Academy universe. While all of his other siblings got to grow up, Five did some weird time travel magic and landed himself in the future, lived out his life and then went back to the past which was really current time?? But he did it wrong so he came back to the current time as a 12 year old? So he has the mind and life experience of a 70 something year old but stuck looking like a freshman in high school. Wibbly wobbly timey-wimey stuff. But that made him a really interesting character to me!
This was a fun cosplay to do especially when the show was just getting popular.
Check out some of the photos from C2E2 2019!
This guy was really cool. I still follow him on Instagram, I think he's a DJ in Miami these days
