Palette
I made the choice to go more MOA-legal with this kit. Most of my garb from the past isn't strictly MOA-legal, but I typically got away with it because of the fantasy elements. I refurbished a few pairs of pantaloons from my former kit, and made a few new pairs to help cement the new color palette (which focuses on blues and purples).
The above pantaloons made the cut, color-wise, but they needed some serious help to get them up to par for my new garb requirements. All of them got new elastic in the waistbands, and all the guts are serged now to help prevent fraying/extend their lives.
These three pairs of pantaloons are the new additions. Braided non-roll elastic in the waistbands, all the seams and edges are serged. Also, all the pantaloons are 100% cotton which helps them be more comfortable to wear during the summer.
I traced a pattern off of a garb dress that I bought on Merchant's Row at Ragnarok a few years ago, shortened the length, and added a cowl collar to produce my absolute favorite garb top pattern to date. It's easy to conceal a sports bra under this style top, it can be easily pulled on (no closures) over my head, it's crotch-length (or longer), and the sleeves are a great length for fighting.
The black one isn't the first one I made. I muslined the pattern in a polyester suiting that's featured in the pile of tunics below.
While the poly suiting would be hell to wear during the heat of summer, it will be perfectly tolerable at night and will dry quickly if I get caught in the rain. Also pictured here is a black tunic I made using a different, and way less satisfactory, pattern, a white linen tunic using my preferred pattern, and a white cotton cowl-less tunic (again using my preferred pattern). I made one lightweight collarless tunic to go with...
...this bomb coat. This is also made from 100% cotton from the quilters cotton section, and was intended to be a wearable muslin for a much fancier white coat that I'll be making at a later date. I used a leaf-and-vine embroidery stitch on my sewing machine to reinforce the center front hem, where I'll add hook-and-eye closures eventually.
It's also worthy of note to mention that I finished this coat well before Cersei's new black coat on GoT was revealed. I'm definitely going to draw inspiration from that costume in the future.
Here's how the new tunic design looks on my dress form. I made this tunic to match a pair of pantaloons I finished recently (they'd been sitting in my unfinished project pile for a couple years), but neither of them match my new color palette. I'll probably hang onto them for events where my character wouldn't necessarily be present, but I really don't care for this tunic or the matching pantaloons.
Lastly, I found an ancient linen cloak in my garage while I was hunting for my box cutter. The hood was mostly falling off, and the inside seams were fraying like crazy. It hadn't been washed before it was stored, so it was musty and muddy and kind of gross. I ran the seams through my serger, reattached the hood, and ran it through the washer and dryer, hoping for the best.
Not too bad. I'm probably going to remove the silver closure from the front and replace it with grommets, so I can attach it to my new armor with hooks. Regardless, a cloak is a good thing to have in your garb arsenal. I'm more of a coat person, but cloaks definitely come in handy.
That's it so far in terms of new garb. I found some purple linen/linen-look fabric that I bought at a garage sale forever ago, and I'm trying to decide if I want to make a wrap tunic (like the Asaka robe pattern) or another cowl-neck tunic with it.
I'm also throwing around the idea of making a black linen wrap-robe using the Asaka robe pattern lengthened to floor-length, with some kind of fancy trim. I'm just unsure how much wear I'll get out of it, and it's kind of a lot of work to alter the pattern and cut out pieces that large.
