Hello everyone! 🦇✨
A couple of weeks ago, I shared with you how my 1887 Batgirl project came to life—from the poll to choosing the historical references. Now it's time to take you behind the scenes and show you the actual making process, because honestly? This costume was a wild ride of worbla heating, dye experiments, and fabric burning (controlled, I promise! 😂).
The Accessories: Mask and Breast Decoration
Let's start with the fun part: the accessories. I created both the mask and the bust decoration completely from scratch, and my material of choice was worbla. If you've never worked with it, imagine a thermoplastic made in sheets and rolls that becomes super pliable when heated—amazing for sculpting, but also a great way to burn your fingers if you're not careful! 🫣
Worbla is perfect if you wish to create identical shapes by covering casts, or when paired with foam bases. I shaped the worbla while it was hot (because once it cools down, it literally becomes a brick).
I started by making a cast of a mask that I own using das sculpting clay. The mask is a Venetian one and it was only a starting basic piece to create the final, more complex shape. Here is the cast I made:
The das sculpt cast wip.
Then I carved the das shape to give it a better look. I changed the eyes into an almond shape and added the muzzle with the nose. I left out the ears as I made them directly at the end with the worbla.
Then comes the first fun part: you can use your cast to make as many pieces as you wish by covering it with a layer of hot worbla and letting it cool down!
Unfortunately my original das cast had a defect and I had to throw it away, but it was still great to make one single mask, the one I then used for the costume!
After having my worbla main piece, I covered some areas with papier-mâché to add texture and dimension. It was messy, it was fun, and it definitely required some patience.
I created the digital pattern for the ears and then made them with foam sheet. Then I covered them with worbla to have the final pieces. This time the foam was not used as a cast, but as a core material to be covered with worbla.
At the end I covered my mask again with papier-mâché and had fun coloring it in black, brown and white. See, here is the result.
The original fashion plate also showed little bats on the shoes, but I decided to skip those—at least for now. Maybe I'll add them later if I feel like the costume needs more bat energy. 🦇
For the breast "brooch" decoration I used worbla again but with a third method: I made 3D round-shaped balls for the head and body, then added the wings. You need to pay attention and handle the material before it cools down for 3D shapes, otherwise you will have a mess. The cool thing is that you can always reshape worbla by reheating it, but after a while the material starts to deteriorate and, moreover, you may worsen your project the more you reshape it instead of making it better!
This time I did not cover it with paper, but I had to paint it with PVA glue to make the acrylic paint adhere to it.
The Dress: From Fashion Plate to Custom Design
As said earlier, the 1887 fashion plate I used as inspiration was quite simple—the bodice looked almost like a corset and was half-covered by a shawl (a "fichu").
While historically accurate, it felt a bit too plain for what I had in mind. So I decided to create my own design from scratch, inspired by 1880s ballgowns, which felt perfect for a dramatic Halloween costume.
For the Bertha I draped two big triangular bias pieces of the main fabric on the bodice, but I will also make a digitalization of its shape as a pattern along the main sewing pattern of the dress, I promise.
I then chose to add some more organza decorations, beads and velvet ribbons because, why not? It is a dress I mainly used for Halloween, I wanted to have more decorations! (But I may reuse this dress also as a ballgown in the future and maybe make an other skirt for it too!).
Dyeing and Distressing: The Organza Journey
Here's where things got really interesting. All my ruffle decorations are made from silk organza, which I hand-dyed from white to shaded black and brown. The gradient effect was exactly what I wanted—something that felt organic and a bit mysterious, like bat wings transitioning from shadow to light.
At first I tried to do it with the hot water immersion method, but it was hard to get a gradient and, more importantly, the fabric lost all its texture! This fabric is beautiful because of its plissé with wrinkles, therefore wetting it was a big no.
The second experiment I tried was to spray it. I wished to buy an airbrush with specific colors, but this project had a smaller budget. Therefore I ended up with acrylic spray bottles and a layer of acrylic paint on the edge. It smelled, I almost choked myself (joking), but the result was pretty.
Also, unfortunately, after a while part of the color began to fade, but it led to a beautiful result as it now seems more textured and a bit old, with brown and black paired with white (the original shade) in distressed parts.
The dyeing process before the colour faded.
Then to get a small frayed, aged look, I burned all the edges of the ruffles. Yes, I literally set fire to my fabric. Controlled fire, of course! 🔥 The burning creates these beautiful, irregular fringed edges that you just can't achieve with scissors. And no, nothing else caught fire in the process (though there were a few close calls 😂).
The dress also has an overskirt that probably won't be very visible in the photoshoot pictures because it's mostly covered by the cape. I'm planning to film some videos here in the studio in the next few days so you can actually see it properly!
The Cape: Bat Wings in Fabric Form
And for the last piece: the bat wing cape. I chose a black slightly crinkled satin fabric and deliberately left it unlined to keep it light and flowing. I wanted it to move like actual wings, not hang heavy like a traditional cape. When I spread my arms, the wing shape is unmistakable, and it adds so much drama to the whole costume. 🦇✨
By the way, I was given a pair of photos of the antique magazine from which this plate came from by a friend (thank you Bellisario__! :) ) and it is an Italian one: "La Moda Illustrata" dated 1887.
In the plate annotations the cape is described as made in black taffeta and boned with whalebones. I chose to use small, very sturdy steel wire instead because they look thinner and create a more 3D shape.
The Final Result
After two and a half weeks of work, the costume was ready for the themed photoshoot organized by Anaïsfashionstylist (Annalisa Tocci) last Saturday. I absolutely love how it turned out! That said, I might tweak a few things or add some extra details in the future—you know how it is with creative projects, they're never truly "finished." 😊*
And here is the final result through part of the photoshoots:
Photos courtesy made by: MA_ZE Ph. Thank you for the amazing photos, you may find his Instagram account here.
Note: the second picture colour shade has been changed by me, with agreement of the photographer, to have a more "antique look".
The photoshoot event was held by Annalisa Tocci and was this one: Click here.
*As I speak I have just added some ruffles on the skirt to have them reach the waistband, speaking of "future changes":
What do you think? Would you try working with worbla or burning fabric edges? Let me know in the comments! 🦋🦇