completed May 2006

Inspiration
This design is a complete disaster. I wanted to do wa-lolita dress, but it kind of spiraled into this toddlerish festival dress of pinwheel-pompom asian stereotype madness. This outfit is what happens when a cosplayer tries to design lolita. >_< FAIL. Basically, everything that you see at the fabric store that you want to desparately use, I used. Except pipe cleaners. Darn it!!! Next time.

Construction
The functional frog clasps are all hand-made; they were too expensive to buy so I googled a tutorial for them. I often get emails about the shoes! I found them at a korean shoe shop in Chicago; yes, they came in that shape! They were plain wood, so I painted them gold and added the matching trim from the dress. The gold “wings” are gold satin stuffed with foamies to retain the shape, then glued on the sides. They totally make the outfit for me.
The candy-colored stone necklace in the photos is from the talented Beverly of charmedseed.net. She does gorgeous jewelry commissions and I own many of her pieces! (You should, too!)

Photos by Elemental, Keir Briscoe – Fabyan Park, IL; Robert Farley, Erik Smith, ZiggyB