Sewing project: Link costume for Halloween

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I’ve decided that I’m going to be Link from Legend of Zelda for Halloween this year. It was Jared’s suggestion, and I thought it would be a good opportunity to make something that would be interesting but not too hard.

Because it was basically just a tunic, I decided to mostly wing this design. I found some pictures of a couple of girls doing a really good Link cosplay, one in red and one in blue, and I’m using their work for visual inspiration. In a thrift store I found a big piece of dark green cloth for a dollar, so I decided to use that as my tunic fabric. It’s a knit, which I’ve never sewn with before, but it’s pretty stable and only a little stretchy. I figured for a tunic I don’t need to be too precise with the fit, so it would be okay.

First thing I did was drape my dress form, now affectionately known as Adelaide, in the fabric. Adelaide is slightly bigger than I am in all dimensions, so in order to make it only a little loose on me I decided to make it a little tight on her. Since it’s a tunic I want it the fit to be a little blousy, and I’m considering binding down my breasts for Halloween anyway. So I cut my fabric in half and pinned the two halves to Adelaide’s front and back, then marked the seam lines on it with chalk.

Next I took the fabric down, pinned the two halves together, and cut along those lines to get too identical halves. I probably cut it a wee bit smaller than I should have, but I think it will be okay. The Link cosplays I’m emulating do not exactly have side seams; rather they have rows of grommets going up and down the sides that are laced up with cord. I inserted six pairs of grommets on either side of the tunic under the arms. I also sewed the shoulder seams.

Then I had to figure out the sleeves. I had meant to draft the halves of the tunic with kimono sleeves, as in, as already part of the pattern piece, but the fabric wasn’t quite wide enough, so I have to make them separately. I know sleeves are kind of tough, so I looked up how to draft your own on the web. What I found, however, was kind of confusing me, because what I needed was how to attach a sleeve to a bodice, but that information was all mixed up in the details of fitting them and everything, which I didn’t need. Tunic sleeves could be wide and floppy. So I decided to wing them too. I cut two long rectangles and finished the ends of each by folding over just a little bit of the knit and sewing it down. Then I folded them in half and matched up those finished edges with the shoulder seam one each side. I wanted the open side to be on top because I wanted to put grommets in and lace them up too. I pinned the sides of the sleeve in place along the armcyes and sewed them. Then I put the grommets in, three pairs for each sleeve.

The last thing I did was attach the trim to the front of the collar. That was a little frustrating, as the trim I found wasn’t as flexible as I wanted it to be, and the only time the knit fabric stretched and shifted improperly was when I pulled it too tight under this much less yielding trim material. The collar isn’t perfect, but it photographs okay here. I may put in facings or interface with a stiffer material to stabilize the neckline. The sleeves from the outside may not be the cleanest attachment job ever, but they look okay also. You can see the current state of the project on Adelaide here. It pulls a little too tight across her bust, but it fits my slightly smaller one okay.