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.  

More glorious wings!

I'm more often than not a starving artist - which means I generally can't afford all the really awesome stuff I'd buy for people if I had more money than I knew what to do with. 

The thing with gifts is, I'd rather not get someone anything at all if I can't get them something meaningful. And if the most significant or meaningful thing I can think of for them is out of my budget it means I don't get them anything...

But sometimes I realise I can make them something just as fabulous - if not more so - purely for the joy of it. 

This is one of those things. 

A work colleague celebrated their first full year at work and it sort of slipped by because so much as been going on in the office. But then I thought of just the thing that would bring her joy and be a very suitable gift. 

Wings! 

I sketched these out based on a Monarch Butterfly wing. 

The cutting is really the most challenging part.
The three layers of card are so difficult to cut through
that my hand just ends up aching by the end.
I recommend wearing a glove! 

Glued down to the cellophane. I left them overnight with
books piled on top to really flatten them out and let the glue harden. 

Cut them out the next day! 

And then glued the wings together using some scrap bits of the
card stock and put looped elastics through to make them wearable.

A bit of animal testing to make sure they work... 

One happy fairy!!! 

How to make super amazing wings!

A few years ago I made myself a pixie king costume. I was quite pleased with it but it lacked one fundamental element that would have made it perfect - wings! 

I decided to refresh this costume for 2014 and that entailed making wings for it. I was about to begin the rather complicated task of sourcing wire coat hangers (These are seriously difficult to find these days.) when I came across a tutorial online that claimed to be a way to make 'Amazing cellophane wings without wire!'

I watched the video and was amazed at the simplicity of the process and how utterly fantastic the end result was. 

So one weekend I gathered up the supplies (Which came to about £20 in total) and set to work! 

First step - take three layers of card stock and glue them together using a permanent spray adhesive. Then sketch out the wing you'd like on the paper. 

I chose a bee wing as my inspiration. 

Next, cut out the basic outline of one wing and use it as a template to cut out the template of the other wing. 

Using a utility knife and careful hand, cut away the ribbing of the wings. This stage requires quite a lot of elbow grease (three layers of card stock is pretty tough to cut through) and patience. 

Apply a strong adhesive or the spray adhesive to the cut out frames and place on bog standard cellophane (Not the shrink wrap kind). 

With the cellophane wrapped around both sides of the frames, use an iron on the lowest setting to 'stick' the cellophane layers together. You can put a towel down between the cellophane and the iron or use the iron directly on the cellophane if you like - but do a test first. Melted plastic is gross. 

Cut off the excess cellophane! 

There are many ways to mount wings and the video I found gives a good quick solution (as long as you can find a wire coat hanger). 

For this particular costume I've got a plan that involves attaching it to the shirt I'm wearing which should make them look like they're growing right out of my back...but that will be for another blog.