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| Photo by Chris Goss Photography |
Struck First gives you a first look at a cosplay just as it's been debuted/had its first photoshoot. Cosplayers have been kind enough to let me have a first crack at analyzing the cosplay by providing me with brand new pictures.
I feel incredibly blessed to have friends that are willing to do collaborations with me as they discuss how they've made whatever I'm sharing. It certainly leaves a more accurate impression for you readers out there. One of my best friends League of Larcy is the newest addition to the collab STRUCK FIRST format. Much like my posts with Mink, I'm gonna let her take over after the article jump. For Anime Boston this year, Larcy took her love of Pokemon and mashed it up with what's known as the CLAMP universe. The end result is a gorgeous cosplay full of fiery red colors, given of course that the Pokemon in question is Flareon of Eevee fame. From the signature ears to armor pieces and stones galore, Larcy really looks incredible. The photos definitely do the outfit justice and I'm beyond excited for you to read her take on it. What's more, she even added in a Materials List to give you guys some ideas! I really hope you all enjoy it <3.
Magic Knight Flareon, inspired by the CLAMP Universe
Materials:
Red Vinyl salvaged from a salvage store
Yellow lace
Faux Fur
Shirt= red tank top with lace sewn on, this is my weakest piece
I can’t remember what my red fabric is, it’s very light and swooshy
LOTS of tulle for the tutu (30 yards cut into strips)
EVA foam- found in the shoulder piece
Craft foam- the stuff you get at Walmart
Fun fact: I made all the gem stones, I cast them in my own molds and colored them with nail polish. It took me several attempts to get them right, and they take about 12-24 hours to completely harden so I had to be VERY patient. The design is based on the CLAMP universe of Magic Knight Rayearth and I combined the characters Umi and Hikaru in their goddess-like outfits that are very flowy and half-armored. I added my own flair, and FLAREON, haha! I love the CLAMP universe and I definitely think I am going to attempt a future gijinka based on Card Captors. I have a Card Captors card deck that I meant to incorporate into this costume (I had the Fiery card) but I couldn’t execute it well enough to add it in with the time I had.
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| Photo by Chris Goss Photography |
To start, I took my adjustable manikin and I duct taped the areas that I was making armor for (essentially just my waist). I drew what I wanted the piece to look like, cut it out, and then traced it onto my vinyl. Vinyl is SUPER fun to work with for armor, and this stuff in particular is a vinyl you would find for a couch so it was stretchy but also had structure, so it was easy to shape and also easy to sew together. The only problem is it sometimes stretched too much and the top layer would rip apart so I had to be extra diligent in securing my seams and my straps. I also put a layer of craft foam inside the waist piece and the boob plate too, just to really solidify it.
My shoulder piece I had to eyeball. I took puzzle mat EVA foam and I shaped it based on the piece of armor that Umi wears in the manga. I had to trim it a few times then heat gun the crap out of it. I added an under piece to extend it a bit more as well and to offset some of the red color with some darker. To color the armor, I simply wrapped vinyl around the foam and trimmed it to fit, and super glued it on. There were a lot of clips involved. I glued the central gem piece but I also put some color behind it to bring out a little more of the yellow I put in it. There’s a lot of red in this costume so I did my best to add other garnishes to off set that, like the yellow fur trim, the yellow bows, etc. It’s an off-the-shoulder piece, so I just used basic straps to secure it to my central bodice and it just hangs gently.
In the CLAMP world, more is more, so I kept adding lace, ribbons, and other flowy accents like my arm skirts. I did a lot of cutting out lace flowers and sewing or gluing them all over the outfit. I even added a shoulder veil last minute that was covered in the little lace flowers I cut out from the lace I used to accent the rest of my stuff. I secured it with a clip that I hid using one of the small yellow gems that I cast using my favorite mold, a candy gem mold (GENIUS I KNOW)! My skirt is simply a circle skirt cut into my favorite cut, a high low. The fun part of the bottom is my tutu, which is just 30 yards of different colored tulle literally tied onto an elastic that is the size of my waist. I actually love that tutu and would literally wear it by itself if I had something to go with it.
My ears are similar to my shoulder piece where the base is EVA foam, just wrapped with faux fur instead. This fur is dyed and took a lot of brushing out to save. I was actually testing a color but it came out so good I kept the scraps and they became my ears!
The tail is also dyed faux fur, which I DO NOT recommend. It takes the length out of the fur and ends up being hours of brushing it flat. But the golden color of Flareon’s tail was achieved so I’m happy with that. The faux fur garnishes were the scraps of gold leftover with hand-painted red flames that I added. I had to downsize my tail 3 times and it is still a little too big. I originally had it arranged so it hooked up inside my waist piece, but it was so heavy it stretched so I made a waist belt that I took in 3 times before it held well and solidly. I love my tail though. Flareon is all fluff and I really wanted to capture that.
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| Photo by Wert Photography |
My leg pieces were also a debacle for me. I had sketched several takes on them but ended with fake straps over laced armor, mounted with gems. It came out okay, but maybe I will remake them in the future to be better.
The last bit was something I added on after I finished the outfit, and that’s the crown! It was suggested by some friends that I needed more decoration on my head to go with all the decoration on my body. So I fashioned a crown made out of craft foam (bad idea because it’s flimsy but it got the job done). I literally took a tribal tattoo that could be mirrored, cut it out, and painted it! I put clips on the end so I could adjust it to the headband. I added flowers and leaves, with fire tones, that were all removable so I could adjust and move them around at will. The crown was a great idea because it also stabilized my fairly heavy ears. After I made that crown, I actually went and designed more flower crowns for my other eeveelutions to accentuate them as well. That was fun!
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| Photo by Chris Goss Photography |
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| Photo by Wert Photography |
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| Photo by Wert Photography |
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Larcy is truly a wonderfully talented cosplayer and person you guys. I hope this look into her brain as a cosplayer gave you some insight as to how people think and solve things differently. The photos are amazing, and Larcy looks absolutely majestic and beautiful. I highly suggest you all follow her at the links below for more of her work :)
https://www.facebook.com/leagueoflarcy
https://www.instagram.com/leagueoflarcy/
