Ranger-General Sylvanas Crochet Cosplay

UPDATE 2/12/23: I don't want to go into great detail about the decision to scrap Sylvanas. It was a recent one and it was not done lightly. To save you from a lot of angst, I'm just going to say that the more I looked at the word I'd done, the more I wished I'd used royal blue instead of navy. 

The Recap: I started this idiotic/genius project over three years ago, but I worked on it very sporadically until about 9 months ago because I had no money because making things for people doesn't quite pay all the bills and also allow one to afford the shitloads of yarn and other things I needed for this personal project. I got a real job, so I had money, but then I had no time - the Great Adult Paradox, I suppose! I wanted to pull this off for DragonCon this year, but if you follow me on any social medias, you know that I worked on it nonstop and then even worked on it at the con and crashed and burned. I didn't have time for all of the detailing and I'm a huge stickler for details. All-ass or no-ass, ya know? But I left off "unimportant details" to save time and then I resorted to scrapping my original plan for how to make the shoulders, and my last-minute changes failed tremendously.

Current Status: Most of the costume is in this bin that I shoved it into when I finally threw in the towel on Saturday at the con, but I have officially removed the lid and I'm going to get started working on structural support for the heavy af shoulders (which still need a ton more detailing, which is going to make them even heavier). Then I'm going to go back and finish all of the details I meant for it to have in the first place.

Future: I swear on all things holy and good that I will make this happen for DragonCon 2019. After stewing about everything while crocheting I ended up not super happy with my wig because it doesn't go so well with my skin tone. So I'll be getting a different and lighter wig. Damn, Arda Wigs so heavy, ya'll! I definitely need a more ash blonde color over the more yellow blonde I chose. I'm also going to go with my original gut instinct to get white out contacts, BUT I'm upping the ante even more and I'm going to run blacklight wire around the trim of the cowl and my eyes gonna glow, betches! I may try to add LEDs into the gems too because I do love making light-up stuff. I'm just not sure how I'd rig all the battery packs and hide the wire since it's such an afterthought. The latter is still on the table and we'll see how it pans out.

I'm also going to go with the more traditional WoW elf ears. They're so gratuitous and I went with ears that were more Dragon Age-ish. But go big or go home, right? I like being at home though, so, uh...

I originally wanted to make the shoulders basically like football shoulder pads with something providing solid structural support in both the front and back and over my shoulders to keep them in place. I knew they'd be heavy and in my haste I even left off the bottom layer of golden leaves to make them lighter, but they were still too heavy to be supported by the yarn bodice piece alone. The support, which will likely be thick aluminum wire - like what I used for the bow - will be hidden by the bodice and a half-cape.

Speaking of that cape...I had always planned to take some artistic liberties with Sylvanas' cape because it would be like wearing a blanket on my shoulders in Atlanta, and just no. I ended up scrapping the half-cape entirely in my haste, but now that I have another year, I'm going back to that. It will have the same detailing and be heavily based on the full-cape.

I'm thinking about getting some extremely thin black tights and securing the leg armor to them. This will be the only main part of the costume that isn't made of yarn. I then also need to do a ton of detailing on the legs and return to the bodice detailing and adding support for my boobs to make it look like they're more ample than they are. The tiny, golden, swirling details were one of the big reasons I chose this as a crochet costume undertaking.

I also must confess, after this, I will be done with crocheting huge costumes. And crocheting costumes. The time involved for these things to be up to my insane standards is too much, and I'm getting old. Also crochet is rough on my elbow. But until then, I hope everyone's excited to see this masterpiece when it's finished. I'm not done costuming because real life is lame, and I'm thinking about doing Philippa from The Witcher as my costume after this.


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