So I have a new, and ultimately heartbreaking update for anyone who has been so gracious as to tune in to what I'm doing. What follows is going to be a very long post:
In the end, my suit turned out horribly, due partly to a poor local seamstress and partly to my lack of assertiveness - which, especially in this case, ill-served me in my endeavors. What I'm going to show and explain is all in the hopes that at least one newcomer to the forums/Spidey cosplay will witness what could and will happen if patience, experience, and care, are not given their just due. I would hate to see any other person, man or woman, make a suit and feel the crushing result that I went through. If this inspires patience (whether it be in waiting for your suit to get finished, or in saving up money to spend money on a truly good suit), or conviction in speaking with any seamstress that you so chose, I'll feel I have at least provided some semblance of a service, and my failed first attempt into this wonderful world of cosplay can at least have some silver lining.
First, I would like to just request that any who view this or comment on this, please avoid any insulting remarks. I know that should go without saying, but this really is a rather sensitive topic for me. Since I was a young child I dreamed of "becoming Spider-Man," and thanks to my own impatience and lack of financial flexibility, I watched that dream crumble. That sounds dramatic as I write it now, but it really was a horrible moment for me. So please, be gentle.
On that same note, I wholly encourage any who do have a similar story of woe, feel free to share it here. If you get nothing but a pat on the back, well, from experience...I can say that means much more than those giving it out can probably understand.
So, here goes:
My problems started with my time limit. Four weeks is not even remotely close for properly putting something like this together. That's the end of it, and I think that's an important thing for everyone to keep in mind. Especially if you're a college student working 3 part-time jobs and taking a 17 credit hour semester, replete with Final Exams at the end of the assembling process. Again, this was nothing but my own error, and I should have known better. I do know better. But the grand idea I had far outweighed the realistic possibilities.
My second problem, was not being as straight-forward with this woman as I really should have. The initial quote I was given was $250 dollars, at a likely 8 hours to assemble the suit. This seemed reasonable to me, considering what I had seen Trophywife and others charge for their time and product. However, when I met with the seamstress (her secretary gave me the quote), she assured me that since I had everything there and all she had to do was sew it together, she could do it in 2 hours, at $50. A miracle, right?! Yeah, that's not gonna happen. A project like this takes talent, a little bit of elbow grease, and patience. Patience was hindered a little on my part, thanks to the 2.5 week strain of time I gave her. However, it was to my dismay to discover that she not only waited until the week of May 1st (the premiere) to start the suit, but it wasn't completed sewing until 5 hours before the midnight of the film. But alas, I am getting ahead of myself.
After hearing nothing for quite some time, I called the Monday before to see where my suit was in the process. Not much had been done, I was told, as without instructions things would be difficult. After 20 years of experience, this seamstress only now decided to tell me that this was her first endeavor sewing something entirely of stretchable material. I contacted Crazydog to see if he had instructions, but understandably so, he did not. No fault on his part, as anyone with sewing experience can pretty well see how the suits are assembled. Assembling them is another matter entirely, however.
(At this time, I would like to apologize to Trophywife. They mentioned her by name, and told me that they had tried to get in contact with her and had no luck. I truly hope this was not the case, and once I heard, I requested that they cease. If you are reading this, TrophyWife, and you did receive such contact from two strange Toledo ladies, I sincerely apologize. If I had known they were planning to, I would not have condoned it. I feel that's rather unprofessional of them.)
Yet, they assured me a fitting would be ready by Tuesday. I got a call Tuesday afternoon that it wouldn't be ready until later that day, and that it should be ready for a fitting in the morning. I arrived Wednesday morning to a rather disgruntled seamstress who was not only upset with me for not having instructions, but upset with the whole process of the suit. She calmed down quickly, but her initial remarks were vulgar and unnecessary. And quite frankly frightening. I'm a small man, and she, a large Jersey-built woman; the odds were against me should a quarrel have developed. Nonetheless, she had me put on what was sewn of the suit, which was mostly the legs and chest. Admittedly, it looked quite sharp. I was happy with it! It already fit quite well, too (which I'd like to hope was due to my lifting routine and diet). She still had to sew the mask, arms, and feet. She asked me a few questions on what connected to what, I obliged, and she sent me on my way to return the next morning to see the suit done.
At this time, I was feeling nervous, but slightly relieved after the initial fitting. When I arrived the next morning, the seamstress and her secretary were nothing but courteous, and showed me what was mostly done of my suit. She added a new zipper (though the zippers were in a rather awkward place, despite initially explaining my desire for a u-zip design), and asked me about the mask, specifically if I had lenses. I told her I did; relatively nice, homemade ones, made out of rubber. She told me that she would be willing to sew them on the mask. - At this point, I should have asked her how. I assumed that she would glue them (she made mention of using hot glue, so this wasn't all just in my head) onto what white lycra was left from the print, and then sewing that white lycra onto the mask, so that the mask would be fitted nicely in place, and we wouldn't have to worry about the stretching of the mask being held entirely by the glue of the lenses. She told me to give her the lenses and come back at 6:30 that night, the night of the premiere, and my suit would be done. I was so excited.
I walked in at 6:30 sharp, put on the suit and made myself believe - at first - that I liked what I saw. But I knew that I didn't. I was beyond disappointed. I felt nothing like Spider-Man. However, thanks to the lenses limited visibility, I couldn't entirely see how the suit looked either. I deemed it at least acceptable for the night, as there was no turning back. The seamstress and her secretary were "astounded" at how great it turned out. They sent me on my way, and on the drive home I asked my girlfriend what she really thought.
After the punching of inanimate objects, cursing, and general frustration, I took a look at all that was wrong with my suit. This is what I found.
*Warning: the following photographs are so terrible, they may cause cringing, vomiting, and possibly disease. View at your own risk.*
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So I feel these first few images pretty well show obvious mistakes that I think any seamstress should and does know. In fact, anyone I feel who takes pride in their work would notice the problems here. But let's look at them, shall we? The first picture is simply to show how the seams look pretty much throughout the entire suit. Once stretched, the white thread (white thread?) shows pretty obviously. Granted, I offered numerous times to pay for thread spools and zippers, but she assured me she had plenty enough quality items to ensure the adequate completion of this suit....gr.
The 2nd and 4th photos show glaring glove problems in the stitching. I don't know how they caused this to happen, whether they cut it wrong, sewed directly on the edge of the material, didn't bother to turn the glove inside out, didn't stretch the material while they sewed or what, but it's both spotty work and careless attention.
The 3rd and 5th photos show the zippers, which consisted of one invisible zipper running up my right side to the armpit, where it met another zipper that ran halfway down my arm. It worked, don't get me wrong, but it has many issues. Firstly, neither the material nor zippers even come close to being together. There's a good inch - 2 inches between both, and the threads stick out, which makes me look like I have random strands of armpit hair hanging out of the right side of my suit. Also, the second zipper isn't even an invisible zipper by any means, and was just a random one she grabbed from around her very, very messy workstation. You can also see the quick, careless job of how the the zipper is enclosed in the suit, and a desire to not even be bothered with clipping the edges off of the thread. The stitching itself obviously isn't even enforced very well. If I had worn this that night (which I didn't), I would have certainly ripped apart multiple seams, just from sitting down in a theater seat.
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Now, I'm tentative to criticize these photos too much - mostly because, if I were sewing this, I wouldn't for the life of me know how to sew these feet. Personally I feel that doesn't really make it acceptable for what happened, however. It doesn't seem that she really bothered to consider the shape when she sewed it. She actually just sewed the two parts together straight and gave it to me to deal with, resulting in these mangy, elf-looking feet. I'm not sure how any sewers on the RPF construct their boots, but from what quality I've seen, I just can't imagine that she did this right. I just can't.
Now onto, arguably, the worst part of this entire suit. Remember when I mentioned what I thought she would do with those lenses? Yeah, she didn't do that. She instead used a needle that I can only assume was previously utilized by Sasquatch to physically sew through the rubber lenses onto the mask. This...this is what resulted.
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(Sorry for the sideways shots, it uploaded strangely on here. Anyways...)
Now, from a distance, it isn't really all that noticeable that the lenses were sewn on. What is noticeable, however, is that THEY AREN'T EVEN ALIGNED PROPERLY. Now this is one thing I was most nervous about, and specifically showed her the placement on the mask, and my face, of where those lenses should end up. I watched her trace it with a tailoring tool (the name of which escapes me). There really isn't any excuse for it. It's disturbingly obvious when the mask is on, too. I'm not sure if many RPF users know what Spoderman is, but I look dangerously close. The final picture is it on my head, the third is my roommate, looking at his hands asking, "How do I shot web?"
How do I shot web, indeed, Lorenzo.
It's also pretty obvious that the mask isn't sewn together all that well, either. This, from what I understand, is one of the hardest parts of the suit to sew, so I could understand it not being perfect. I really could. But the lenses....it's just not okay. And because she didn't stretch the material when it was sewn, the lenses jut out the sides of the mask instead of wrapping around the sides as they should.
In a last minute effort to make myself presentable, I cut the mask off against a straight edge (it was previously attached to the entire suit. What you are seeing are photos taken after, once I had calmed down), and attempted to attach the urethane spider with super glue. I was planning to live with the mistakes and wear the suit without the mask, and style my hair in an Andrew Garfield fashion. The glue needed at the minimum 2 hours to cure, however, and I had only time for 1 and a half hours - again, a lack of time causes problems - so, to what should not have been my surprise, the front spider did not stick. Instead, what was left was an undesirable stain in the shape of a spider on the front of my suit. At the premiere, I wore street clothes and the mask from my 90's joke costume and spent many a grieving minute explaining the situation to friends and coworkers who were excited to see and support me in making a childhood dream come true.
So that's it. The nightmare is - seemingly - over, and I am left with nearly 300 dollars of wasted money, on what should and could have been a quality Spider-Man suit. I've toyed with taking the seams out and attempting to make the best of it. Perhaps even practice sewing some lycra myself. Alas, I just don't have the heart for that right now...
Any seamstresses reading this on the RPF, I do want you to know that this isn't meant to be a critique of seamstresses. Your work and time is highly valued, but I'm also sure they you take much more pride, and care, with what you do than this woman did. I think the thing that bothers me the most is that she didn't do that. And tried to pawn her work off on me as an acceptable job, which it isn't. I hope I haven't offended anyone at all, that certainly is not my intention.
Thank you for reading and listening to my venting frustrations, and I hope that this at least gets out to those new users/Spidey enthusiasts that need that extra kick in the rear to make sure they make as many right decisions as they can. Don't let this happen to you. Thanks everyone!
And don't worry, I'll be back with another suit. And, if she'll have me, will hopefully employ the services of TrophyWife and her adept sewing.
- Mondu
