Pixie!

Well, here it is in all its glory! The bits I've shared over the last month of wings and mask-making come together in one fabulous Pixie King costume. 

Thanks to my brother for some helpful photography capturing the entire outfit. 

The finished mask - did a little selfie. 

Do not mess with the Pixie King.  

Happy Hallowe'en!

Tomorrow is Hallowe'en!

As a Canadian this holiday is a significant on in my social calendar. If I were in Canada I would most definitely be attending a party - possibly two - and decorating wherever I lived with all the fake cobwebs and Jack o'Lanterns I could afford.

This year I've got a few commitments that came up so my day will be less about the holiday and more about collecting people from the airport, feeding them and seeing off a dear friend at their leaving do.

I will almost definitely be wearing one of these:

Sketch...

Cut out...

Mould...

Paint...

Add details...

Finished!

Hallowe'en shenanigans!

Hallowe'en is in just a few days. I was on the ball this year with my costume making. Since moving to London I've found my resources are greatly reduced. In Calgary I had a very tiny room in the house I live in that I used as a studio. This allowed me to get quite mucky on a regular basis and have multiple projects going at once. It also allowed me plenty of storage space for scraps of material, bits of chicken wire, and other crafty stuff that worked well for costume design.

Just before I move to London I also made a big effort to purge my life of 'unneccesary' stuff. Anything I hadn't touched in a year was either thrown out, donated to charity or gifted to friends, depending on the state of it.

What I could bring over was stuffed into two large suitcases that couldn't weigh more than 50lbs each and everything else was put into storage to await my eventual (possibly, maybe) return.

I did keep a few things but they're all in Canada. I also had a pretty good list of stores where I could source supplies from and of course, I had that space in which to work.

Since coming to the UK my costume making has become far less fulfilling. I still have all the same great ideas and enthusiasm, but finding the space hasn't been successful. Regardless, this year I decided to get started sooner rather than later.

The first step was deciding on what I wanted to be. I have a long list of costume to make, and eventually I will when the time is right, but I knew that most of them were far too ambitious given a current lack of funds. Whatever it was would be clever and creative but also simple. 

I opened up my Book of Faeries - a childhood favourite and one of the few books I simply had to bring with me from Canada - and scanned the pages for inspiration. I considered Jenny Greenteeth but didn't immediately warm to it when I considered how I'd go about it. I scanned the pixies, although Pixie King has already been a costume I've done and I seek to do something different every year.

And then I saw the Phooka, an Irish Goblin that likes to shape shift into animal forms and often has the head of a goat. This reminded me of 'Snuff' the latest Discworld novel from Terry Pratchett, which also features goblins. Perfect. 

So, this Hallowe'en my costume is that of a Goblin. I'm quite pleased with the outcome. I've been commissioned to make the occasional costume for others and would love to do it again. If you like what you see visit www.FaunawolfCreations.com to find out about commissioning work from me.

First I build the basic shape of the mask on my face using plaster cast.
I use warm water so it will dry faster as the entire thing is done on my face
in one go so the sooner it dries, the less time I have to wear it. 

This is a new to me material - one of the problems with making plaster masks is that
they end up weighing quite a bit. I figured I could give this a go as it's a light, foamy material
and it air dries. The initial mask I did didn't work as, when it dries, it also expands the
plaster so it no longer fit my face. 

After some careful sculpting I have covered the entire plaster base with the Fimo.
I did a single layer all over and then built up the eyebrows, nose and lip.
I added the horns and ears last. 

When it was dry (24 hours later) I painted it using acrylic.
You can see that I still had some side expansion but it still fits nicely so I'm not worried. 

And voila! My goblin face is complete! 

I got the vest in a charity shop and
picked up some faux-fur (Just half a metre) to make the loin cloth.
The brown 'body suit' is a cheap set of leggings with a tight fitting shirt.
I used a little acrylic paint to add the muscles.

For more of my artwork visit www.faunawolfcreations.com

London Journal - A Year ago....

A piece of public art in Cambridge

It's the 31st of October. A day for wee ones to don costumes of all shapes and sizes, a day of carved pumpkins, a day of crisp fallen leaves and a touch of frost.

It also marks the day a year ago when I first boarded a plan to the UK. I was a bit mad with my scheduling for that trip. I rose at 6:00am, dressed in my Halloween garb and headed to work. I worked a full eight hour shift before coming home to a well decorated house. Loads of people came over for a party, during which too much candy and other sugary things were consumed. I was bubbling with excitement and a sense of anticipation.

At midnight my parents arrived, there to provide transport to the airport. I bid the party-goers farewell, loaded my suitcase into the car and was whisked away.

At the airport I said my goodbyes, gave my kisses and headed for security. Once through on the other side the fact that I'd been up since 6:00am began to hit me full force. I was exhausted and my flight wasn't going to board for an hour and a half. I found a quiet corner near my gate, set my backpack down as a pillow, and tried to get some sleep.

It's amazing how much can happen in a year.

That first trip was a test to see if London was really the place for me. It was a gauge of where I'd be living, how I'd be able to find a job, what sort of stuff I could explore. I knew then that I loved it here. It was new and exciting for me. It was fizzing, bubbling potential. I was bursting with ideas and hopeful for what would come.

I've not actually been living here for an entire year yet. This just marks that first step into the life I'm now leading. I shan't review my year until January 7th, but today I did feel like reflecting on that initial discovery.

This year my Halloween celebrations have been far more subdued. I think this is largely due to Halloween just not being a big deal in the UK, but it's also difficult to replicate that anticipation that was an undercurrent last year.

Change is good. I do like that this year has been more relaxed and involved far more sleep. There was still a fabulous new costume to unveil and a party to attend. Some things never really seem to change, even when everything about them is truly different.

Happy Halloween.

Halloween

This is what a Pixie King looks like.

As a child the year was not divided by months nor seasons but by holidays. Summer was a significant one, obviously, followed closely by Christmas. But one of the holidays I looked forward to most was Hallowe’en. I’m not a huge fan of candy and if I never saw a single horror film in my life I wouldn’t see it as a loss. For me the appeal of Hallowe’en is rooted in the making of my costume.

Each year I would seek to create something unique. As all of my friends would prepare to be de

ad brides, zombies, devils and ghosts, I would plot and plan and often agonise over the perfect costume. Instead of a black cat I’d be a white one. Instead of buying a mask from a shop I would build my own from papier mache. I would choose characters from books like Harriet the Spy or Gollum (Long before Lord of the Rings was made into a film, when none of my classmates knew who I was or had heard of The Hobbit.) or I would make characters up, like a Killer Marshmallow or a personification of the night sky.

This year my costume is actually still in progress. I made the top and bottoms myself and put together a crown of ivy. I used my prosthetic mouth and ears and grease paint for the face. It's not done but it was done enough to suit me for this Halloween. I need to make wings yet, and perhaps some nice Pixie feet, but I like it as a working project as I want it to be wearable again and again. To tweak it each time I wear it out will involve unveiling another bit. Perhaps this is a costume that will never quite be done, especially as Pixies really do come in great variations.

The Pixie King and the Devil

I am a pixie king!

For those of you who don't know, I'm a Pixie King. Always have been, but until this weekend I've not had the outfit.

It's not complete yet as I still need to make my crown, but for now I'm quite chuffed with what I've done in just a few hours. I'm especially pleased given the fact that I didn't have access to a sewing machine and I had to do the tail by hand.

Yesterday I went shopping for paint, make-up and the perfect top and bottoms. I did quite well, sticking to a budget of 20 quid*.

*Sometimes I really wish I had a UK Keyboard so I could type the pound symbol instead of writing 'quid' all the time.

Today I painted the stripes...

...hand sewed the tail...

...and assembled the trousers.

Next weekend I'll do the crown and if I have time and can find the right supplies, I may do wings as well.