1st performance

I finally got to perform in my new costume. I entered a competition this weekend, in the category Rising Star at the Stars of Bellydance Festival in Bruge, Belgium

I got 3rd place!!! :)

Here is a shot from after the ceremony! More pictures coming

With 2 of my best friends!!!

Ms. Blingalicious rocks! ;)

Life is beautiful!

There you go :) On body pictures!

Still without padding... Without the inside covered... Without extra bling (see drawings waaaaay back...)

As you can see, on one side there's a 'big' gap under my arm... I'm gonna try & fix this now... Don't know yet how...

I'm wearing my black LRose skirt & I think (due to lack of time) I'm going to be using this one! I'll add some bling of course!!! And this means I can use my poppy red veil that's lying there on the floor!

Completely covered!

The bra is completely covered now! A total of 24 meters of rhinestones went on there :) Madness!!!
There is still a lot to do though: attach straps, place hooks, add padding & cover the inside...

Dilemma!

So I added some more bling (the simple line at the edges...) and I'm starting to doubt if I should cover the entire bra (like originally planned) or leave it like this...
I could add some big stones (they are just lying there on the 2nd pic...)

Can you say: bling?

I wish I had more time to work on my costume. A few evenings of work later, both cups & straps are covered.

I present to you: Blingalicious

It's been suggested to me to take daylight pictures... However I have been at work all day & it's midnight now. This will have to do for now... The entire left cup & strap is covered now! On to the right one :)

Evolution

Do I really need to comment on so much bling? ;)

The bling starts!

Started with a strap first... I left them long at the top of the bra so I can use it in one flow to cover the cup... Then started at the bottom of the cup, working my way up... A lot of work, but loving it already!

Silver finished

It's completely covered, now BLING BLING BLING

Skirt fabric

I was very set on making a black skirt for this costume. HOWEVER, when I was in the fabric store I came across this one & was immediately in love ;) The picture doesn't do the color justice... It's an 'appelblauwzeegroen' (teal?) I think... Very hard to describe, but looks much more blue in the picture than it really is...

The down side of this color is, that I had already ordered a poppy red veil from Fairy Cove (which arrived yesterday) but I don't think it will work for this costume... So I still have to get me a black costume ;)

Silver base

After the bra was covered in jeans, I started putting the base on there. It's a shiny silver fabric.

Covering the bra

Few days ago I started covering the bra with jeans as a solid base. I also replaced the bra straps with something non-stretchy (don't know the name in the Dutch, so I won't even try it in English ;))

Bra designs

I tried sketching a little bit the ideas I have in my head for the bra design... I don't have any drawing skills though :p

Of course, the entire bra+straps is entirely covered in rhinestones (or at least, it will be) but I didn't draw those stones on the sketch. It's basically to see what kind looks prettiest. The extra decorations on the designs are also strings of rhinestones.

Design 1



Design 2



Design 3









All suggestions welcome! (Oh, and I don't have any HTML skills, which shows :p)

White bedlah

Because I am lacking some more materials --> I've decided to make the bra myself, cuz the VS one didn't turn out to be as perfect for this as I thought... (it's a really tight fit...), I am looking for the perfect bra base to get me started...

So in the mean time I bought myself a white chiffon bella skirt to match my white bedlah. At one point I took apart the 2 halves of the belt, to finally adjust it to my size. And here is the result. Though I'm not happy about it... It's not a perfect fit YET... (and I've realised I'll be needing more confidence before I'll dance like this...)

I'll be doing some bra sketching this afternoon for the rhinestone costume... I haven't decided on what design yet...

Patterns

Now chosing in which pattern the bling has to be put...Here are some options...

Differences aren't big, but there is some difference... All aligned or not... Horizontal or vertically placed...

The base

For the bra, I'm using a simple padded black bra from Victoria's Secret, since I have NOOOO idea how to make your own bra...

26 meters of bling!

Today I was in bling heaven! I ended up chosing the AB crystals (aurora borealis) and ordered some 26 meters. Apparently you need LOADS to cover an entire bra ;)

So much bling

The first 'hard' decision. What kind of strass to use...

Ordered one meter of each to make a real life decision!

The beginning

The idea is simple.
A bra FULL of bling.
A simple plain skirt (with some bling).

Let the games begin...