One thing I would like to note first is that I made a few additions to the character design. I tried to keep everything as close to the original design as possible, but I wanted a more "serious" look to my Vaati costume. I went with a darker color scheme and embellished a bit on the designs. In doing research for Vaati, I came across a few drawings of him where he had boots instead of the Gladiator sandals, so I went with that look instead.
Originally I did this costume to fit in with a group, but since then I've really grown to care about Vaati as a character. It warms my heart seeing how many people truly appreciate this character and someone willing to cosplay him. Like Puppet Zelda, he's a lot of fun to wear because of the creepy factor. It's so fun being evil!
The first piece of this costume I started with was the cape and the hat. They are made from a black/navy blue taffeta and the cape was lined with a straight black taffeta. I found the gold and blue trim and it reminded me so much of the clouds in Wind Waker that I just had to use it. The tunic is a polyester material. I appliquéd cut pieces of the cape onto the bottom and around the sleeves to make those dark designs around the tunic. The pants are also a polyester fabric and I appliquéd a silver ribbon around the trim at the bottom for a bit of extra color. The boots started out as a man's dress shoe. I cut the boot shape out of vinyl, sewed the pieces together, and then glued them to the base shoe. The belt was made with vinyl folded over fun foam and painted gold to match the armor.
The claws (yes I just had to make claws) were a spandex glove I made and glued fake nails to it. I used the same spandex material to make leggings to wear underneath the pants and boots. The armor (and sadly there wasn't much) was a lot of fun. I started with a piece of fun foam, covered it in wonderflex and made the raised details with model magic. I tried to add just a bit more detail to it, so I added the lines along the crown. The button is made with just model magic. I incorporated Vaati's monster eye design into it by adding a thin strip of model magic to make the lid and a resin gem to make the eye. The other resin gems on the crown and belt were an experiment that was a wonderful success. I decided I wanted to make the other gems look like eyes, so I made shapes out of wonderflex and shoved them into the curing resin and let it cure inside it.
The ears were a custom mold I made and put latex over so they fit only me. I painted them to match my blue makeup. The contacts were purchased from my favorite Halloween store and the makeup as always is Ben Nye Color Cake foundation. The wig is a lovely long light lavender wig that I cut and styled. It was probably one of the easiest wigs to style, but it does need constant maintenance.
