Beauty And The Beast Costume

by Renee
(Los Angeles, CA)

I was Jack Sparrow two years in a row (as long as it was relevant, why not?) and so I decided that I wanted to have a really girly Halloween costume that year. So I decided to go as Belle.

First I bought a costume pattern that I intended to use for the full costume, and a few yards of yellow fabric. I'm not much of a seamstress, unfortunately, and the pattern was WAY to complicated for me. It included a corset and boning and lining- that's way more than I can do! I did, however, use the pattern for Belle's skirt. What I ultimately did was to find a dress at a thrift store (turned out to be a bridesmaid's dress) that had the cut I was looking for.

The dress was gun-metal gray and had a full skirt and tulle underneath. I stripped it down to just the zippered top portion and then covered it with fabric by hand. That wasn't easy! Then I sewed the skirt to the top portion so that it had a bit of ruching. Then I bought about a half-yard of fabric to make her sleeves. All I did was fold the fabric over, sew it together with a few basting stitches, and then sew it onto the side of the dress that didn't show.

I found another very thin, chiffon-like fabric and used it as a sort of bunting across the dress, like Belle has. I managed to get lucky and find a full crinoline at a thrift store, too! I got a clip-on fall (a type of hairpiece) and my yellow, elbow-length gloves from a costume store. I got the pink rose from Michael's. (I wanted to have ruching on the dress like Belle does, but I ran out of time. :( )

I made the whole costume for less than it would have cost me to buy a mass-produced one. I think it's better than a mass-produced one because I got to pick all the fabrics and details myself. I got lots of compliments that night, and lots of pictures taken of me and with me!