KH3 Sora’s jacket construction process
Hi everyone! This is Tory, the most talkative one behind Simili Anonyme! Yeah, I know, we’ve both been preeeetty quiet lately. What can I say, we are busy people. Anyway, I made this thread on Twitter (@floracoquelicot) and I thought it could be cool to share this here as well since Tumblr makes it easier to find old posts, and this might be helpful!
So Salt (ShioOuji) and I did and art trade lately, which led me to the making of Sora’s jacket. I will detail the process as much as I can right here. Feel free to DM me if you need any other information :D
Costume : Sora (Kingdom Hearts III)
Time elapsed : ~65 hours (spread on 8 days)
Yelling and saying I will give up : none this time (yay!)
Step 1 : Gathering your references.
So you wanna cosplay Sora, right? Good! What you first need to do is getting to know the clothes you’re willing to make. I’m going to focus on the jacket here, and trust me, depending on which reference you’re using, it’s going to look different.
On the first picture, the jacket looks like it’s mostly made of leather/pleather. On the second one, it looks a lot more this the usual mysterious Nomura Fabric that I feel looks like a lot like neoprene. You can see two flaps with plaid fabric, going around the zipper ; this means they are sewn behind the zipper. The jacket is lines with black fabric, it has some pretty big pockets and golden buttons. Only one zipper, of a very respectable size, which is almost surprising, and the sleeves are bicolor. I must say, knowing Nomura’s love for ridiculous outfits, this one looks pretty normal.
The reference I used the most, though, is one from @art-antonioalvz giving a whole look at the jacket (as well as the trousers for y’all artists)
https://art-antonioalvz.tumblr.com/post/159503686722/i-made-a-cosplay-reference-guide-for-soras-kh3 (even though I am crediting and linking it, if you feel like that’s just reposting feel free to message me and I’ll remove the pic, it just felt clearer for the explanations!)
This picture is incredibly helpful mostly because you get to see the sides, which is not something you’ll easily find in your reference pictures quest.
Got all your references ready? Let’s move onto stage 2!
Step 2 : chosing your fabrics
I have worked with 9 different fabrics for this jacket. Here is how I broke down the jacket:
Horizontal band - Vertical band - Sleeves band (red)
Plaid fabric (Black & Red)
Picking the right shade might sometimes be a bit tricky, so make sure to get samples to compare them, as they might look different from what you see on screen!
Just look at all these shades and swatches!
Now, about the fabrics I used: the idea behind this jacket was that it wasn’t made to be a costume, but something to be worn IRL. So instead of trying to be completely accurate with my fabrics, I picked something more casual, comfy, warm, that would feel great to wear. And who doesn’t love a good jersey? (I sure do). Jersey is stretchy, thick, and not too hard to use. Make sure you own some Stretch needles for your sewing machine though!
The red, black and sleeve grey fabrics are jersey fabric. I did not keep track of where I bought them, but they are pretty thick with a fluffy, plushy side on the wrong side.
My white bias tape is some leftover stretch bias tape I bought at my local fabric store.
The white fabric I used for the bottom line is a very thick neoprene fabric.
The pocket fabric is some dark grey neoprene.
The lining is a thin black cotton, really soft on the skin.
The plaid fabric is something I designed using Spoonflower. You can get it here(click!) if you’d like.
Add 6 buttons of your liking (I used bronze snaps, will explain later why), a silver/grey/black zipper, and you’re good to go!
Okay, so now we’ve know what we want and we know what we’ll be using to make it. What are we missing now?
There are different ways to use a pattern for a costume.
You might never use patterns. If you are really comfortable with draping and are used to understand and draw shapes just by looking at them, this step might be useless for you and you can jump to step 4.
You can make patterns based on clothes you own. Turn the outfit inside out and draw the shape of each piece on paper, following the seams. Don’t forget about the seam allowance! You will need to cut bigger pieces to sew along the lines.
You can use pre-made patterns. That’s the option I chose. I’m really bad with sleeves and not really used to hoods, so I decided to buy a pattern made for this costume.
This pattern was made by Anh Cosplay, and you can buy it here(clic). It includes a PDF for the jacket and the trousers in different sizes, explanations on how to sew them, costs $9 and is super helpful. Anh also sells many other pattern on her shop so make sure to have a look!
And now we’re good to go!
Step 4 : Making the costume.
Okay, now everyone works differently. I will explain how I worked, but by no means this is the best or the only way.
The first thing I did was, using the pattern, making the lining. Some people like to make mockups first with a cheaper fabric to make sure the size is right. That’s somehow what I did with my lining - I had a lot of that cotton and I could redo things if I didn’t like them.
I cut the pieces, pinned them, tried it on, stitched them together with some lose stitches, tried it on again, readjusted a few things until I was satisfied, and then sewed them together. And tried it on. Never enough checking that everything’s fine!
Alright! Now that we have our jacket lining done, it is time to work on the outside. The process is the exact same, and I would suggest following the pattern instruction if you bought it.
As I said, trying things on will help make decisions. What you can see here was my first try for the plaid, which I didn’t like very much. I also felt like the flaps from Anh’s pattern were too big and didn’t fit the proportions I wanted to achieve. This is why I resulted to design my own fabric, using Spoonflower.
Designing isn’t always right from the first time, and it actually took me a few tries to get what I wanted ;)
As I mentioned before, this one is made for casual wear. Which means I wanted it as convenient as possible. There are many options for the buttons (that, while not being oversized, are still kind of big), but I went for snaps for a practical reason : that way, you can fold the flaps inside the jacket and can zip the jacket aaaall the way up!
When the flaps are inside the jacket, you can zip it up. Convenient when you’re cold!
Make sure to sew the pockets and the buttons-snaps-whatever before adding the lining! Same thing if you want to add inner pockets or anything you’d like ; once the lining and the outside are sewn together, there is no going back. (I mean, there is, but it’s a hassle)
The flaps are sandwiched between the zipper and the lining. From the picture above, you have your layers like this : Red-Zipper-Flaps-Lining.
I handsewed a few pieces :
Stitching the top (white) of the pockets to the black fabric, and the bottom red line to the lining.
Sora has some decorative horizontal stitching on some pieces (the white one and the red ones) but I didn’t trust myself to get lines straight enough to look good, so I didn’t do them.
We have a lovely jacket, a bit heavy (it is just under 900g) but oh so comfy. I cannot wait so send it out to the Saltdom where I know it will be loved and well taken care of <3
I hope this was at least a bit interesting! My DMs are always open if needed. Now it is time for me to fall back into Oblivion! (which is apparently where I live, housemates are a bit weird but they’re okay)
(and if you ever wanna see more cosplays by me, you can find me on Facebook as Tory Cosplay(click!) :DDD )
