#costuming tutorial

My tutorial on painting elf ears appears to be making the rounds on Pinterest again, so I thought I'd share it here. 😊 If you have any questions about the process or if you used the tutorial to paint your own set of ears, let me know!

Since I keep trying to explain facings to friends (and keep feeling like I’m failing miserably), I decided to do a longer tutorial, after all, about how to I use a facing to sew keyhole necklines on simple medieval-style tunics. This is an attractive and sturdy neckline for LARP/Dagorhir/SCA garb. I’ve used it on literally hundreds of tunics.

This tutorial ended up getting pretty long and scary, but don’t worry: this is not a complicated process. It’s just hard to explain over the internet. So-- let’s go!

What is a facing, anyway?

A facing is just an extra bit of fabric that you sew to the edge of your garment and fold down to conceal a raw edge. I use them on necklines, instead of folding the edge down in a traditional hem. If you don’t get the concept, @vintage-aerith has a great tutorial here. Facings produce very sturdy, flat, and non-bulky edges.

For example, this tunic has a keyhole neckline finished with a self-colored green facing. The edge of the neckline is NOT folded over and hemmed: the facing is an extra piece of fabric that was stitched on to the edge and then folded to the inside. You can see the ‘lower’ edge of the facing-- it’s the darker green line about 1.5″ in from the edge. I then tacked the facing down with embroidery. It’s a very clean, unobtrusive finish.

This tunic has a very fancy external orange facing, combined with a collar! The process is very similar to above, but the facing is flipped to the outside. This is an easy way to add color to a garment. (Forgive my dork-face and overlarge tunic-- this was for a customer who’s about a foot taller than me!)

You should use facings because:

Hemming necklines is a pain. The curve will not want to fold down flat. Facings, on the other hand, are exactly the same size and shape as the neckline, so they automatically lay flat.

The point at the bottom of a keyhole is a nightmare to hem, and if you hem it badly, it will fray and rip, fast.

When you fold down a neckline to hem it, your neck-hole gets bigger. When we’re talking LARP/SCA/Dagorhir garb, a bigger neck-hole always means more sunburn. If you use a facing, you’ll get a neckhole exactly the size you planned.

Hemming stretches your neckline out. The more you handle a cut piece of fabric, the more it will stretch. A stretched out neckline = more sunburn, again. This facing method minimizes handling of cut edges, so the neckline stays nice and tight.

Facings are fast and easy once you understand what you’re doing and why. I can knock one out, start to finish, in about ten minutes. No lie.

Now that I’ve convinced you that facings rock, onward!

1. Make Your Facing Pattern

You’ll first need a pattern for your facing, and to make that, you need to know what size you’d like your finished neckline to be. I recommend a neckline that’s made of a circle that’s about 5.5″ in diameter and a 3″ slit, like this. This is juuust big enough that it will pull over most heads. 

Draw your 5.5″ circle on a bit of scrap fabric. (I traced a saucer onto a sheet from a charity shop. Pure class, me.) This will be the hole your head goes through.

But, you protest, a 5.5″ circle only has a 17.25″ circumference! That’s way too small for anyone’s head! Well spotted: we’ll add a 3″ long slash down the center line so you can fit your head through. 

Now we’ll mark the center and shoulder line. Since your tunic has a front half and a back half, you’ll be sorely tempted to put half your neck-circle on the front and half on the back.

But if you do this, your tunic will be really uncomfortable! Your neckline will constantly creep forward around your shoulders. This is because most of your neck is actually in front of the shoulder seam, so 2/3rds of your circle-- about 3.66″ on a 5.5″ circle-- should go in front of your shoulder.

Add 1.5″ around the edge of the hole and and around the slash. 

Cut the fabric out along the outer line.

Cut out the center hole, and cut down the slash. Note that you’re just cutting the slash open with one pass of your scissors-- you’re not trimming anything away. 

Now you have a mock-up for your facing. It should look something like this. (Mine is super ugly because I’m traveling and only have terrible blunt scissors with me.)

Pull it on. Can you fit this over your head? Does it lie comfortably? If you can’t get this over your head, cut the slash a tiny bit longer and try again. If that doesn’t work, make the hole a tiiiiny bit larger. Remember that a smaller neckhole is better (sunburn!).

Don’t be fooled by my weird face-- I am happy, because mine fits okay! I’ll now trace my mock-up onto a bit of sturdy poster board, making sure to mark the center front, back, length of the slit, and shoulder seams with notches.

The front white piece is my facing pattern, which I use to trace out the facing piece on fabric, ie, the background piece in olive green. Note that the fabric facing does NOT have the hole cut out. This is important!

Next, we’ll...

2. Cut Out Your Facing

Lay your new pattern on a bit of your fabric. Using chalk or a fabric-marking pencil, trace it all the edges and mark all the notches. Cut along the outer line until your facing piece looks like the dark shape in the photo above.

Here’s where it gets tricky, though: you won’t cut the interior circle, yet. This is because that inner edge isn’t really an edge at all: it’s your stitching line. When you’re stitching your facing onto your tunic, your needle will follow that inner line that you’ve chalked onto your fabric. See how in the photo above there’s a line marked in yellow chalk on the dark olive green facing? That’s the stitching line, so DO NOT CUT THE CENTER HOLE OUT IN YOUR FACING.

Similarly, DO NOT CUT A HOLE IN YOUR TUNIC YET. We won’t cut either hole until the facing is stitched to the tunic. That’s right-- it will look and feel really weird, but trust me, there’s a good reason for it.

3. Finish the Edge of Your Facing

The outer edge of your facing will fray if you don’t do something to prevent that, so take a moment to serge or zigzag around the edge of your facing piece. It’s way easier to do this before you stitch the facing onto your tunic.

4. Stitch Your Facing Onto Your Tunic

Okay, so. I like to start by sew the neckline on my tunic before I do anything else. That way, if I screw it up, I haven’t wasted time (or fabric) by adding sleeves and gores and stuff. 

Note how, in the picture above, no holes have been cut in the facing or the torso panel. This is not a mistake. Why aren’t you cutting the holes, you might ask? Well, fabric cut along curves stretches. Badly. This is bad news if you’re trying to match the hole you cut in your tunic to the hole you cut in your facing. Getting them to match requires a ton of pinning and fussying and delicate handling. I hate pinning and fussing, so I sew my facing to my tunic before I cut any holes. This way, everything is stabilized nothing can stretch out. Cool? Cool. Now, my torso panel is one long rectangle, which makes up the main front and back of my tunic-- there’s no shoulder seam. Fold your tunic in half both ways and use your iron to crease these folds. These creases now mark your shoulder line and center lines. You’ll use them to line up your facing.

Lay your facing onto your tunic, right sides (ie, outsides) together. Make sure to match facing to the tunic’s center front, back, and shoulder seams. Remember how 2/3rds of your neckline will be on the front of your tunic? Check that, now. When your facing lays straight and flat and properly positioned on your tunic, pin it in place. You’ll now slowly stitch through both layers along the line you marked. The slash is a little different, though, so see the picture below for an explanation of how to stitch around it.

The stitching travels around the slash, with about 1/4″ to 1/8″ between the lines. The bottom of the slash should be crossed by just 1 stitch. If you use more stitches, this point will pucker when you try to flip it to the inside.

Once you’ve stitched along the entire stitching line, you’ll finally cut the neckline open.

Be extra careful cutting the slash open. You’ll cut through the gap between the two rows of stitching, stopping just shy of the stitch at the very bottom of the slash.

Okay. So, you’ve got your facing sewn to your tunic, but all the raw/cut edges are still exposed. To fix that, you’ll now fold the facing to the wrong side (ie, the inside), so the raw edge will be hidden inside the fold. This can be a little tricky, so be patient and use plenty of steam with your iron. To turn the points out, use something pointy but blunt, like a big bamboo knitting needle, to poke them right-side-out.

Once you’ve got your facing turned to the inside of your tunic, iron it well so the edge of the neckline is flat and crisp.

Hooray! All that’s left, now, is topstitching through the tunic and the facing in matching thread so your facing won’t creep back out to the right side. I like to use two lines of topstitching-- one 1/8″ from the edge of the neckline, and another 1″ from the edge of the neckline. Make sure you’re catching the edge of your facing!

Hooray, you did it! That wasn’t so bad, was it? And look how sturdy and clean your tunic’s neckline now looks. That keyhole is never going to rip, I tell you that.

My friend, the infinitely talented and wildly creative Stellaria, offered to let me host some of her old garb tutorials, and I leapt on the chance. First up, here’s her take on how to make simple “ghillie” sandals. I’ve made and fought in these, and I can confirm that the easiest garb shoes you’ll ever make. Now, over to Stell! This is how I make a pair of ghillies - basic footwear for celtic-ey or viking-ey type characters. They're easier than turnshoes, and look kinda cool... but they ARE rough, and you'll get grass in 'em and stuff when you fight. I just deal with it, usually, 'cause it's better than barefoot. The shoes look like this when done:

Laid out flat, the pattern looks like this:

I made my first pattern on a scrunched-up brown paper bag - if you scrunch it, it gets more flexible, and you can actually use it to fit it to your foot to see if the tabs are in the right place and are the right length. Once I got my brown paper copy the way I wanted it (about 5 tries, I think), I made my permanent copy on pattern fabric. Ilsa: Stell uses Pellon Tru-Grid, a pattern fabric that can be found on the interfacing rack at the fabric shop. Each square is 1″.

Notice on the pattern how there is a tab in the back, and there are cuts about 1/2" long that extend into the body of the shoe?

That's so you can fold the tab up, fold the back edges over it, and lace it all together to form the heel-cup. It's important that both sides of the heel are the same length so it will lace up properly.

This is what the heel-cup looks like when done.

I used a scrap of deerskin to spiral-cut the lacings, which are nice and strong and supple. They're just poked through holes I punched in the leather, and tied on the inside. You can reinforce the heel-cup if you like by cutting a semi-circle of leather and gluing it to the inside of the heel with leather glue.

Once you get the heels done, all you have to do is run lacings through the holes until you find a lacing configuration that stays put the way you like it and conforms nicely to your foot. Lacing goes a lot easier if you use a couple large needles to run the lacing through the holes. Getting the first X in place and pulled tight is kind of tricky.

Now, tie 'em on! 

They'll feel a little funny at first, but once you wear them for a while and the leather has a chance to conform to the contours of your feet, they'll be AWESOME.

For reference, I think the first pair at the top are made from about a 3-4oz split cowhide (suede) that I salvaged from a fake-sheepskin barn jacket I found in a thrift store.

The smooth leather pair at the bottom are cut from 5oz cowhide. Ilsa: You’ll need about 4 square feet of leather for one pair of shoes.

Someone requested that i´d do some tips on how to combine research material into an actual outfit for a character. I hope this helpss, it´s a bit complex and can be hard to figure out at first, but eventually it will come naturally to you, and you may not have to go over all the steps every time.