My take on ELVIRA: Mistress of the Dark!

[LadyMegatron]

Elvira- She made the B rated horror movies look a thousand times better, put new meaning to being a vampire woman, brought big hair back in her own flair and a golden dagger she'd 'cut you' with if you didn't like it, and made the Oak Ridge Boys sing her name (......okay, not the last part, but they did have a hit song 'Elvira' and are one of my all-time favorite singers so I had to include them! Giddy up!) I might not be the best one out there to don the outfit of the famous mistress of the dark, but she's long been one of my dream cosplays and I'm giving it the good old 'why not' Meg's-going-for-it-anyway shot in the dark and diving head first into Elvira mode. I will actually be a second generation Elvira in my family - my Mom once costumed as her when she was in her 20's too! So this one's for my Mom and me......
When it comes to being a vamp, I'd rather go old school and big hair than glitter junkie any day. :love Take that twilight. :behave


I'm making the whole thing myself of course, from wig down to even the jewelry, since buying the 'official' stuff at costume stores is way overpriced and they totally suck quality wise. The pre-made costumes and wigs are costly too and terrible looking if you ask me. Handmade is much better, even if it is a tad bit different. I am a sucker for detail so I started studying her first by watching some episodes of her show again, and then gathering reference pictures.
I started with the earrings, her ring, and the wig.
First was the wig. The Elvira wigs are too beehive looking to me, so I found a black 'poof' wig for cheap. $4.99 instead of $30 for the official, and when it came, of course the bag didn't do it any favors. So I took it all apart, brushed the whole thing out, cut her bangs in and started styling it my way.

Finished wig!

 

[LadyMegatron]

Up next: Elvira's ruby Ring!

I love my local flea market! I found all this 'junk jewelry' for $3, including the little ring that was perfect for Elvira's huge ruby. Only problem was, it didn't fit me, so I had to modify it.

But for $1 for the ring and $3 for all the other stuff? I wasn't complaining. I put the rest of it to use on something else I'm making, and bought a new bottom piece for just 79 cents to fix the ring so it'd fit me, and fit the correct finger.

I did a little bit of reworking it with an engraver and dremel on the bottom and undersides of the setting to get it to sit, fit and look right. The original way it was set the bottom was causing problems, so I had to fix it. Then I glitter glammed it up a bit with some silver jewelry paint to add to the pretty overlooked detailing around the ruby setting, sealed the whole thing to make it hopefully look more realistic, and ring- DONE!

Oh if only it were actually a real ruby on my hand that big!

 

[LadyMegatron]

Earrings-

Elvira wears silver snake earrings, but once again the 'official' ones look terrible and cost way too much, so I made my own!

Started with some spirals I found for $1.

And started cutting, tooling and shaping them to be the snakes, and then painted them.

Earrings are almost done! Just have to add the red ruby eye jewels.



DAGGER-

THIS was a challenge. There is very little reference of her actual dagger, and a lot of different ones out there that go with the pre-made costumes, so I had to just wing it pretty much, and come up with a combination that suited me and still looked decent and would pass as her jeweled dagger.
One consistent thing on her dagger, was it always had a large red ruby jewel on the hilt, and stayed in a small sheath on her belt.


So I started with a long toy sword, and started chopping it up to alter and make into what I wanted.

This is the pieces as I was working on the take-apart of the sword and reconstruction into a little dagger.
http://i1096.photobucket.com/albums/g326/LadyMegatron/Elvira/100_2272.jpg

Progress continued, from piecing together the body, adding the jewel, then painting the body, and sealing it all, then adding details.

Added a top purple jewel to it, just to make it 'mine'. (purple's my fave, and the top needed something, so did this.)

More jewel and detail work:

Sheath-

]

Finished-

 

[Omnedon]

Great project! I was always a HUGE fan of Cassandra Peterson (aka. Elvira, mistress of the dark) and the campy "B" horror movies. Man, thats been a long time …!
Good luck, looks terrific so far!

 

[Hermes]

Lady M, just to help you out with something I did long ago to an unphotographed Elvira Suit (shame on me), the girl didn´t have nearly as much hair as Elvira.... (not to mention not even nearly as much... endowments, which posed a problem for her to look like her, but more on that later)....

what I did regarding the wig was getting TWO wigs. One of them was a very straight one, and the other was a poofy one, but small, kinda new-wave, and then I sewed the center of the shorter one to the top of the longer one. The result was amazing

I hope that helps

 

[clancampbell]

Brilliant! Looking forward to seeing more!!!

Rich

 

[peterparker]

Don't forget the double sided tape to keep the shirt on the right areas!

 

[The Wolf]

Looks like it is all coming together well.
Good job.

Wolf

 

[LadyMegatron]

Hermes- thanks, that does help! And uh....I kinda don't really have to worry too awful much about the um....endowments.....I just have to worry about making sure they stay PUT, like peterparker said! LOL!

This is the dress, and the leather/velvet belt work I've done so far. It was something we'd made for a previous occasion. I believe it was once a witch outfit in a previous life for something I did for a school event for some elementary kids a few years back, and it got shoved into my cosplay trunk under all my various pirate gear. I just so happened to remember I had a black leather belt in that trunk, or else I'd not have run across the dress again! SCORE, it was close to the right style, and fit decent enough to start modifying. A few alterations got this-

But some work still has to be done of course. We've taken the sleeves back off since then to shorten them just a tad so my hands don't totally disappear under mounds of 'tatters', and worked on the bustline some (to drop it a bit and pull a really annoying drawstring out of the neckline too) and to make sure of no costume 'malfunctions' either. Not too sure if I'm brave enough to tackle adding the other split seam up the other hip or not after adding the first one already......

 

[LadyMegatron]

(On another small note, that was taken a few weeks back, I've done more since then but had to stop due to other costumes taking priority, and I've lost some noticeable weight since then too. This will look MUCH different next time it goes on.)

 

[CMG1976]

The tip about using two wigs, a short one and a long one, is exactly how it's done. A long straight wig with layered sides that frame the face/chest and one shorter wig on top.

 

[Ford W Maverick]

Looking good!

 

[HeZoR]

Sweet dagger

Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk

 

[Koipond]

You may want to consider wearing some singlet style shapewear under your dress. Besides smoothing your silhouette it would provide anchor points to secure your neckline thoroughly and let 'shape' your assets. I did something similar with the pirate costume I wore for Halloween and it helped with that surreal cleavage look while making sure nothing popped out while leaning over to hand out candy.