Princess Anna of Arendelle Travel Outfit Construction Notes

*click on the pictures to make them larger
I searched traditional Norwegian costume and bunad before making this costume. All the different bunad I came across are so pretty! A bunad dress and coat are originally made from wool, shirt is linen or cotton, lots of embroidery details (Rosemåling decorative art was used for Disney’s Frozen outfits), and they wear silver (halssøljer=the neck closure silver, there are interesting jewelry to look at for inspiration on the heart closure). In the end of my search I decided I wanted the costume to look comfy and handmade look. My costume is not perfect but I hope these tips/ideas help you make your Anna costume!

☆ Wig
I bought a strawberry ginger blonde wig at eBay. It’s a nice color and soft, but it wasn’t orange enough so I added orange sharpie by hand. This photo shows the real color and the photo on the right is a bit more orange. I had to make the side parting, the wig was originally parted in the middle. I sewed on a weft from Irisviel’s wig about where the parting starts.

☆ Cloak
I don’t like to spend a whole lot on cosplay, so I looked for a similar texture to wool (wool is expensive) which is flannel. I brushed the fabric to make it somewhat look like wool lint. I drafted my own patterns for the cape, the top part was time consuming. All the applique details were cut from Alexander Velvet Cannes Wine fabric (found in my fabric box and this fabric is discontinued at fabric.com). It’s top stitched to the cape and the 115 semi-circles are hand sewn plus the pink embroidery (DMC) details. The cloak is lined with charameuse satin red fabric (found in my fabric box). The poms were originally pink, I dye them with violet ritdye for polyester. It didn’t turn completely violet. I must have done something wrong, so I had to somewhat hand paint them. The long part of the cloak is hand stitched to the short top part of the cloak.

☆ Clasp
The silver heart closure is made out of super sculpey and the details are carved in with a pencil. Once baked I painted it silver, weathered it, and added lots of varnish. I also added a bit of silver with a metallic silver pen (not shown here). Behind the clasp there’s a hook and eye closure on the cloak for extra strength for closure.

☆ Bodice V2  
The old bodice no longer fit so I cut my old bodice to use it as a pattern for my new bodice. I used Stretch Velvet and a brown/gold Offray ribbon this time. It’s much more comfortable to wear and the length of the bodice is about right! I also used the same embroidery from the old bodice by cutting it carefully around the fabric and I pasted to the new bodice using fabric glue.

☆ Bodice V1 and long sleeve shirt
I used the same kona cotton sage fabric from Kozue’s for the long sleeve shirt. The vest I used the back side of Bijoux Faux Leather Textured Black, left overs from my LR costume. I made my own bias tape from the gold fabric left overs from my sister’s Saber costume. All the embroidery is done by hand. I suggest to look at this site: Embroidery 101 for embroidery help, it worked for me! For the design on the back of the vest I looked at Disney Park’s costume for reference.

☆ Skirt
I wished I had bought more yards to make the skirt flow more and add more panels, but it’s about right. I did have issues with the fitting which was a bit too tight. I used navy and sky blue flannel for the skirt. The embroidery was also done by hand and it took forever! You can take a closer look at my embroidery on the left photo. I love the way hand embroidery looks.

☆ Underskirt and pants
I used the silky backside of white fur fabric (also found in my fabric box) for the inside skirt, it makes me feel warm! I painted the designs with silver Tulip’s dimensional fabric paint. Here’s a closer look of the design on the white skirt from the movie: white underkirt. I used sky blue jersey fabric for the pants, it’s really stretchy and soft material . The applique designs were all drawn out, cut out, and heat n’ bond to the pants. I added white crochet for embellishment. Here’s a closer look at the details: pants1, pants2.

☆ Hat
For the hat I used the same flannel color of the cloak, leftover purple fabric for the trim, and lined it with leftover red velvet fabric. The fur was a Tinkerbell fur from Jo-Ann that had silver shiny stuff on it. I had to take off all the silver out of the fur. Here’s a rough drawing of how I made my hat. A closer look at her hat design: design.

☆ Mittens
For the mittens I used blizzard fleece fabric. It was the easiest part of the costume. Here’s a rough sketch of how I made them in a simple way. Also, a closer look at the embroidery on her mittens: design. I later added the missed detail on the back of her glove, I pasted a darker blue color flannel with fabric glue (left image).

☆ Boots
The boots were originally brown cowboy boots. I had to cut the inside to stretch the boot tall. They are painted with a mixture of black and textile-medium paint and the gold design I used Tulip’s dimensional fabric paint.

☆ Eye contacts and makeup
I used QT H-type 3-tone Super Turquoise eye contacts from kiwiberry1-collection. They are comfortable and the color looks great in good lighting. I use E.l.f  products for the brushes, blush, freckles, and eyeliner. I use Ben Nye for the foundation. The eyelashes are from eBay (Search: specialized made by hand entirely), it comes with many packs of different types of eyelashes.

-C