[This post is part of a series about constructing Jareth's entire masquerade ball costume. Visit the master post here.]
Fabric Selection [Part 2 of 2]
The Drama of the Lining
Hello all you fine goblins, goblinettes, masqueraders, bog creatures(?)... I'm back to ramble a lot, and unless you are really into sewing or want to make this coat, this post will probably bore the hell out of you but by all means here it is.
Firstly I want to say that I'm part of a Labyrinth cosplay group now, have a beautiful Sarah waiting for me in just a state above, a masquerade dancer who is already my good friend, and we'd love to do a dreamy photoshoot for everyone at a ballroom or wedding venue somewhere between us. However, I'm financially strained. I'm working extra shifts, offering commissions, etc, but it's only doing so much. If you've made it this far and have been appreciating any of my content, please consider tipping the blog. All the posts have a button that looks like this ($). Please help us unite. Please please, throw a dollar into my guitar case, won't you?
ANYHOO! I'm not good at lining, as I think I've mentioned. There's a lot more I need to learn to get it looking good and structured, and in this case there was so much gravity working against it too. I also am sure you notice that there are ghastly black stitches across the middle of the pleats on the inside... had thought that wouldn't be showing... whoops.
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We’ll start with the creamy, slightly sparkly, crimped(?) fabric that lines the tail first. It doesn’t appear to be lurex/foiled silk or satin, as it seems to be even lighter weight than those fabrics. That’s the first thing that I would say is important about picking this lining: it needs to be something SUPER LIGHTWEIGHT.
The reason being that, at least for the way I did the pleats, there was as much of it needed as the velvet, as it all got folded together. Even if you didn't do it this way, you would only want to add the least amount of extra weight as possible, using something that is still durable and isn't going to blow every which way.
That made the search pretty limiting, as did the fact that it needed to be opaque, flowy, and non-stretchy. Originally when I began searching, I was looking for things like organza or chiffon with crimps/ridges, which looked very pretty, but they were too sheer unless layered, and layering would have made them too stiff.
After doing further research post-completion of the coat, viscose seems like it would have looked and behaved correctly, since it's soft, light, non-stretchy and not sheer, but apparently it isn't the most environmentally friendly fabric, so it’s something to consider. There's also cupro, though I've never gotten my hands on either of these so it's hard to say that definitively. It’s supposed to have a similar appearance and drape as silk, but it's not quite as shiny. It's opaque, and unless it's mixed with elastane or rayon it's not supposed to be very stretchy either, which leads me to…
What not to use: a stretchy fabric, like for any lining on any project. I already made that clear, but did I follow my own advice? Not this time. I got fed up with fabric drama and settled for a very pretty but stretchy foiled fabric, hell if I know what it was because it was late one evening at Jo-Ann Fabric, and I was Over That Shit™ and suffered a lapse in judgment. The result was slight warping from over-handling, and the entire seam between it and the inner facing was bubbly. I’m still kicking myself. Shoulda’ gone home. Shoulda’ said “no, Jo-Ann.”
Here's what I used. Yeah, it's pretty right? But that's all it is.
Another thing to note is that there are subtle ridges in the bottom lining. Not pleats, but like, crimping? It’s a very similar texture to Sarah’s dress. Searching for terms related to ridges would help find something similar, and as for colors, I searched for mainly creams, or borderline beige. Sometimes “champagne” also yielded good results. It’s definitely not white or even ivory, as white will turn the color scheme of the coat way too cold, stark, and sterile. Ivory (while warm-toned) may have the same effect.
It helped me to look at a color wheel and decide the most complimentary combination based on the exact shade of blue that my velvet was. The ballroom coat’s actual shade of blue may seem to vary based on the photograph, but after seeing a lot of reference photos, I started to be able to tell which ones had been, em, tweaked, enhanced, etc. and that tended to be the ones that presented it as electric blue or leaning towards turquoise. The true shade seems to be like one shade cooler than true-blue. Am I making sense?
Given that, the lining’s shade of cream would need to be basically a pure cream color, not leaning towards rosy/orange NOR towards green on the color wheel, in order to be complimentary. However, for anyone who’s making the coat who wants to use a warmer shade of blue for the velvet, this is perfectly fine, it just will change just about every other color choice that you make, down to the color of the jewels and buttons. You may find that all your other blues need to be warmer shades, and that a rosier cream lining (champagne) looks best.
Before moving on to the top lining, I want to mention that there is - strangely – a piece of cream colored tulle in the back? Not sure how that looks if you were to open the coat and look in, and since I couldn’t think of a way to make that look good, I didn’t include it.
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The top lining! We can’t see what’s in there, so this comes down to intuition and preference. I wanted a fully lined coat that looked good and had an aesthetically pleasing transition from one fabric to another, so I pretty much lined the top as if it was its own mini jacket, and I chose satin in a slightly lighter shade of cool blue. A little too light to be called navy but I’m sure people still would call it that.
I wouldn’t recommend using the same fabric used on the tail for the top because the fabric for the tail seems too textured to be smooth enough to get in and out of without issues. Best to stick with classic lining: silk or satin, in blue or a neutral that would match something else on the coat. Black, cream, maybe even dark/metallic grey or silver? The extra challenge of using a shade of blue is that you’d have to be very discerning about whether or not it matched. I had to take the velvet with me everywhere when making my decisions.
Almost nothing featured here is what I used, but here's me being diligant and bringing my swatches everywhere.
Not only did the color have to match, but the texture and amount of shimmer also mattered. Super matte silks/satins seemed to anchor down the splendor of the sparkling velvet too much. The really shiny fabrics looked best. I settled for something a little more subdued, but okay. It was okayyyy. Again, I was Over It™.
#project hail mary
#the amazing digital circus
#photography
