Petshop of Horrors has been one of my favorite mangas for several years and I am thrilled to finally have the opportunity to create a costume from it. This costume is definitely a labor of love for me; it's easily the most expensive costume I will ever make and hopefully the most restrictive movement wise that I will ever have to wear. There were a lot of firsts involved in this costume; it was my first time drafting an entire pattern, my first time working with resin, and my first time creating a complicated up-do wig. There are definitely aspects of it that I feel I need to change or fix before I wear the costume again, but I was thrilled with the reaction that it got at Anime Boston. A sincere thank you to everyone who complimented me and my friend Sara (the Mermaid), it meant a lot to us every time we heard it.

Nitty Gritty on the costume is as follows:

Wig - was made of an "innocent" wig, which was straightened using hot water and an iron & wet towel. The extensions (2 packs on each side) were connected at the temples and then the pigtails were rolled around plastic curlers and pinned and hairsprayed into place. The pearls on the top were strung and sewn into the wig after all of this was finished. The pearls on the extensions were threaded onto elastic.

Dress - was made of casa satin and lined in cotton. The pattern was drafted by me (without the use of any sewing form unfortunately) and took me a week or so of continuous cursing to get approximately fitted and workable. The sleeves were the easiest part and the fit in the torso of the dress the most difficult.

Tail - was made of spandex and stuffed with poly-fil. Rather than make a cylindrical tail, which is not so snake like, I made a bottom panel with interfacing, this allowed the tail to drag naturally like a snake's. The tail is a walking tail, meaning that it is a skirt until my knees and then flares to the side in the form of the tail.

Beading - the resin jewels (all 100+ of them) were cast and colored by my friend Sara. The beading was mostly done by myself, with some help from her. There are somewhere between 8,000-9,000 glass pearls covering the entire costume (so it's REALLY heavy). Sections of the pearls were strung before they were attached to the costume, others were attached individually. Due to time constraints (I only had about 2 months to make the costume) all of the pearls and resin jewels were glued to the costume.

Awards: 2nd Place Master Craftsmanship ~ Anime Boston 2009, 1st Place Master Presentation ~ Anime Boston 2009, Staff's "Great Cosplay" ribbon ~ Anime Boston 2009. This costume was also featured in Cosmode #32 "Cosnaps in the World Wide".