Beauty and the Beast Belle's peasant dress (2017)

First things first, a good friend of mine is literally Belle from Beauty and the Beast. Ever since I have known her, she has been in love with the original Disney animated movie. Belle has been one of her biggest influences since she was a little girl. Not only has Belle made a huge impact on who she is, but Emma Watson has been as well! So you can only imagine her excitement when Emma Watson was set to play the bookworm princess herself!

A few months before the movie was set to release in theaters, my friend came to me with an idea of making Belle's peasant dress from the new movie, I REALLY wanted to make it happen for her. I've never really made a costume for anyone else, and I was so excited to take on the challenge. I immediately tried to gather as many pictures from the movie as I could, I wanted to make it as screen accurate as possible. While Sarah (my friend), started searching for the perfect fabrics, I took on the search for patterns.

Patterns
 I took a look onto burdastyle.com , one of my favorite resources for patterns due to their low prices and instant downloads! I felt like I hit the gold mine when I found their vast collection of dirndl dresses. I sent a few different links to Sarah, and she ultimately decided on this one , which was a great choice. I was able to print it out and start looking at what I needed to change within the pattern to get the results we wanted.

First, I knew that the front bodice seams needed some re-adjusting. The middle piece was too narrow, I wanted the seam to lay a little further out, right next to the straps.

This very middle seam is a bit too narrow for the look we wanted, so I extended it right next to the strap.

Not much of a change, but it really helped with accuracy! Also, if you look at Emma's dress, it is clear that she has an extra "flap" of fabric that is sewn into the front right seam, wrapped around to the other side. For this, I traced the section of the bodice pattern pieces that would be covered by the extra flap, with tracing pattern paper. I added a seam allowance all around this new piece for the reason that I would use two layers of fabric. I also had to make a new piece for the part that the flap would attach to. I traced the back half of the side front piece, again adding seam allowance due to double layers of fabric that would be used. Ultimately, this piece would be sewn into the left side seam.

Left side front piece

For the skirt pattern piece, the directions have you draft it yourself since it is just a large rectangle. I wanted the skirt to lay just above Sarah's ankles, so I added ten inches to the length of the original drafted measurements. I used the apron pattern piece, but simply sewed it onto matching bias binding for a more simple appearance.

As you may notice, I did not use the dirndl's sleeves, or the part that peeks out above the bodice. I used a separate pattern, also from Burdastyle, of a drapey, thin shirt. You can find the pattern here. This shirt is pretty simple to assemble, as there are no notions, interfacing, or closures to be installed. The sleeves lay just above the wrist, and the neck is a little draped.

For the towel strap, i made blue bias binding out of the same fabric as the bodice and skirt, and sewed the two towels into it, folded over the ends, and stitched a line all the way down.

Fabrics
Sarah did all of the shopping for the fabrics, the main color is a medium blue cotton or cotton blend fabric. The middle of the bodice is a red floral calico cotton or cotton blend fabric. the extra flap on the front of the bodice was made out of a terry cloth-like fabric that I had in my stash. The apron was a dark blue and white plaid cotton fabric. For the shirt we used some old curtains that were white and very sheer, Sarah had these leftover and it truly worked so well!

Notions
Interfacing for the whole inside of the bodice (I pieced together used dryer sheets because I'm thrifty like that)

7-9" invisible zipper dark blue (skirt)

7-9" separating zipper dark blue (bodice)

Fourteen 5/32" Eyelets (Get the tool kit if you don't have the tool already)- bodice

Red and white yarn (bodice)

Blue thread

White thread

Two towels similar to Belle's

Construction

Bodice
Once I had the pattern pieces figured out I was able to begin the construction of the dress. I used the new pattern pieces to cut out my fabric. Before sewing up the bodice, I placed the flap fabric right sides facing, sewed at the 5/8 seam allowance that I added, trimmed the allowance, and turned it right side out. I ironed the flap and then top stitched all around at 1/2". I did the same thing with the attachment flap piece. Both pieces were then sandwiched into their corresponding seams on the bodice, pinned, and then sewn together. I followed the rest of the directions on the pattern as they were. When attaching the lining I was sure not to catch the extra flaps that I added. I also skipped sewing the straps together since I will be adding eyelets and lacing through them.

Skirt
The original pattern builds the outfit as a connected dress, instead of doing that I made the skirt separate from the top. To do this, I simply added a typical waist band to the skirt, still keeping the original slit for the zipper.

Other than these changes, I followed the patterns as written.

Here are a few pictures of the finished product with the princess herself!

Princess Anna Coronation Dress Cosplay

Finished product with iron-on designs

From the first moment I saw this dress on the big screen, I knew I had to make it! It is so unlike any other princess dress I’ve seen, with all the details and box pleats and just EVERYTHING!! The problem was, I had absolutely no idea where to begin, or how to construct this dress. I put off the project for a long time until I came across the adult Frozen costume pattern by Simplicity. Unlike the Simplicity Pattern for Anna’s travel dress, this one is constructed in separate pieces and is much more authentic! I loved having everything I needed in one package!

Bodice

Following the pattern, I constructed the bodice with black velvet, black lining, boning, and green bias binding (I made myself) for the trim. I used a matching green cotton and decorative lace for the sleeves. I made this dress before I had a machine that could embroider images larger the 4″ so I hand embroidered the design on the bodice. Although, the result is awesome, I accidentally used the concept art bodice design rather than the screen version. OH WELL!

Skirt

Following the pattern, I constructed the skirt with three different colors of green cotton. From what I can remember, this skirt took a while to make, but wasn’t too complicated. Once it was fully completed, I started working on the designs. WOW, this took so much patience and time. I followed the pattern’s technique of tracing the designs onto paper backed fusible webbing, ironed the webbing onto the fabric, used an Xacto knife to cut out the designs from the fabric, then strategically ironed the pieces onto the skirt. The designs looked pretty good, but after a while some of them began to fall off. Later on, once I bought a machine that could embroider larger designs, I took off the iron on pieces and embroidered with the design I bought from this etsy shop. It looks so much better!! 😀

I was also having trouble with the pleats gaping open and just not sitting right, so I used a zigzag stitch going all they way down each side of the decorated panel, onto the inside panel.

Shoes

The easiest part! I bought some black flats at Wal-mart and used gold bias binding around the opening of the shoe. The first time I painted on the design, but once I got my embroidery machine, I embroidered the design onto black fabric and glued it onto the shoes.

Necklace and Hair clip

I bought these from fellow artisans at these etsy stores!

Necklace: fandomrevolution

Hair clip: aishavoya

We had a little less than 8,000 salad plates

Embroidery! (Never got a pic of me wearing it)

PHOTO SHOOT TO COME!