Costume Creation: Flamingo-go

Aloha Lovelies. Lily O Lei here. It’s been a while since I wrote a blog and I am happy to share a little inspiration with you in this post, Costume Creation: Flamingo-go.

In our most recent show – Burlesque Summer Salon, Cabaret & Cocktails decide to re-vamp our Flamingo number with some new choreography AND new Costumes. We decided to really lean into the Flamingo vibe, with a mix of different shades of pinks & textures. We also went with a very Vegas Showgirl look, with a tear away panel skirt, corsets, feather bustle and my favorite, Feather head pieces. Miss Sadie Vine took over making the panel skirt, bustle and head pieces all for scratch. I was in charge of the bras.

I wanted to have a mix of textures, sparkle, and feathers. I also wanted to make sure that they all looked cohesive since our bra sizes range from AA to DD 🙂

My idea was to cover the top half of the bra cup with rhinestones and flat back pearls, then have the bottom half covered in three different types of feathers to create a three-dimensional look.

Only having to rhinestone the top half of the bra cup went pretty fast since I didn’t have a pattern but just added in randomly to fill the space. This also allowed me to cover a large space with the glue and then add the rhinestones & pearls, which is much faster than having to add spots of glue for each added gem.

Working with the feathers was much easier than I thought it would be. I added the base layer by using the same E-6000 glue that I used for the top half. I then added the next layer the same way. To fill in space I added a bit of glue on the end of the feather and poked it into place between the other layers.  To cover the feather bases, I added a row of large flat back pearls.

For the bra straps, I wanted ribbons with big bows that would hang down our shoulders. I found some satin ribbon on a big spool. You need to be wearing the bra or have it on a dress mold to size the ribbon correctly. Once you have the length you want , you can cut and add a few stitches to attach the ribbon to the strap. One ribbon for the front, one for the back, tie in the middle on the top of your shoulder. Voila!

Since the main focus was the bra cups, I decided on a few rhinestones & pearls randomly applied on the side bands of the bra.

I was also in charge of sparkling up the corsets, panties, and head pieces. I did a random pattern on the corset and pantie, but did decide to make a fluffy feather heart-shaped crotch cover to go on the front of the pantie. If we are going to have a panel skirt reveal, there should be a sparkly surprise underneath. 🙂

It was a super fun project and I can’t wait to wear the costumes again for another Burlesque show in the future.

XOXO – Lily O Lei