Borrowed Costume: Yang Guifei

If she turned her head and smiled she cast a deep spell, Beauties of Six Palaces vanished into nothing.
Hair’s cloud, pale skin, shimmer of gold moving,
Flowered curtains protected on cool spring evenings.
Those nights were too short. That sun too quick in rising.

The emperor neglected the world from that moment,
Lavished his time on her in endless enjoyment.
She was his springtime mistress, and his midnight tyrant.
Though there were three thousand ladies all of great beauty,
All his gifts were devoted to one person.

Po Chü-Yi, The Song of Everlasting Sorrow

Yang Yuhuan, more commonly known by her title Yang Guifei (Imperial Consort Yang), is thought to be one of the four most beautiful women in Chinese history. She was, of course, so beautiful that it was a curse. Both sides of the rebellion believed her to the root cause of the Emperor's negligence and the loyalists demanded her execution. The Emperor ordered that she be taken to a Buddhist shrine and strangled to death.*

She was first married to a prince, one of Emperor Xuanzong's many sons. There various stories about how she came into the Emperor's favour, but she did and was eventually made imperial consort through a ruse that involved her briefly becoming a Taoist nun (thereby voiding her first marriage).

Like many famous female figures of folklores, there's an uncomfortable aftertaste of sexism that comes with her story. It can be said that her story revolves around the trope Love Ruins the Realm (warning: tvtropes link) for not only is she responsible for a rebellion, it also marks the beginning of the Tang dynasty's downfall. But it isn't just Love that ruins the Realm, it's the woman. It is a theme that threads through Chinese folklore: Red Dye Ruins Water.

For it is women that causes the downfall of monarchs and nations: the Emperor, wallowing in the pleasures of the flesh, gives in to her frivolous demands (famously the lychees were relayed to the capital from Guangzhou) and allow her corrupt relatives free reign at court.

Most of stories I know present her as hopelessly tragic, fatefully cursed and politically naive. She is both the root cause of the Tang dynasty's downfall and yet without true agency its cause. It is not her ambitions or her scheming that tears apart the Imperial court, but simply her transcendent, immortal beauty. She is more analogous to Helen of Troy than a true femme fatale.

As almost synonymous with beauty, Yang Guifei is also interesting for the fact that she is often held to be plump. She is alluded to in the saying about differing standards of beauty, often contrasted with Zhao Feiyan, who was said to be very slender. (Which of course, makes this a terrible cosplay of her. But there are only so many historical women who have distinctive outfits.) The way she is talked about, the way her alleged beauty is described (and sometimes discredited) is especially interesting given the various pressures on Asian women to be skinny.

Numerous poems, books, films and so forth have been inspired directly and indirectly by her. Tale of Genji, regarded by some as the first novel written by a woman, was inspired by The Song of Everlasting Sorrow (partially quoted above). Various sumptuously costumed tv series are linked to here. There is even a musical, named Sacrifice, though I feel rather ambivalent about their understanding of the story: "Ultimately the message is simple; true love means sacrifice. [...] This great story enticed three western authors to China, intoxicated by its exoticism. What they found is the perfect vehicle for drawing west and east together; a transcendent love story that is, in fact, universal."

The costume comes in three layers, though only the scarlet outer robe is really visible. The hair is not a wig, though only a portion of it is my own. The shape of the train is what makes this costume really dramatic, with the sheer expanse of red. Tang dynasty costume was very much about a high waistline, enormous flowing sleeves and long, long skirts. At one point, the skirts actually started above the breasts.

Since we've also been on the subject of costumes for Empire LRP of late, it seems worth mentioning that the shape and flow of these robes would make for good Urizen costumes, though certainly not the colours. The red is far, far too bright for the pastel-loving spire-dwellers. The use of brocade as trim has potential, but only if it were very muted in its pattern.

The full story behind these photos was told in the preview post and the other photos from that day can be found filed under Xiaolongnu. A set of robes like these can be commissioned from the Mercenary and would likely cost between £50-150, depending on number of layers and choice of materials.

More photos under the cut.

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* The version I remember as a child was that he issued her with some dozen metres of red silk - a roundabout way of telling her to hang herself.

Empire: The Many Paths of Navarr's Great Dance

Navarr was odd for us in that instead of doing all them as a set, we did the three sets of costumes separately and thus had no group shot. It seems that these Navarr are loners and walk their own separate but intertwined paths (after all, they do seem to be tracking each other).

This is the only set of photos that we've done with any form of Lineage makeup. We had originally intended to do one with each nation, but it was soon obvious that this would be impractical given how we had intended to do all the nations in one weekend.

The Slander Rat was originally done up as a Draughir, but due to the Designer wanting to do some gill makeup (closeups under the cut), she was swapped over to a Merrow. The pale grey (or more accurately, a lightly applied black and white) colouring the Draughir was tinted green around the eyes and mouth. The colouring around the mouth in particular gives her a more fishy, inhuman look. The fluttering gills are done with tissue paper and latex over a patch of skin coloured black and red. The Designer describes it as a sort of latex papier-mâché. The black and red snazz provides contrast with the gills as the move.

There are quite a few photographs of myself festooned in half of my troll kit, which last appeared on that Carthaginian Philosopher. The jewellery was made by myself (though that feather is borrowed off a straw tricorn).

None of the bows in the house proved to be plastic-free enough to be photographed and in the end, there was only the beautiful quiver and some arrows. There's probably a story there.

The Navarr costume guide recommends long, close fitting boots and the only pair of those I own has a faulty zip on the right boot. Thus was necessitated the belt to hold it shut and the Navarr penchant for belts and straps is thus further fulfilled.

The armour worn by the Ginger Ninja is that set that was made for a Dragon Age cosplay some time ago. It was made by Julie Knox and is still for sale. It would fit a medium-sized man. The leather shoulderpiece is part of a matching set and was made by the Slander Rat (among her first efforts) and the goatskin skirt, inspired by Morrigan's in Dragon Age, was made by the Designer. The mantle of many furs (including rabbit, goat and sheep) is also by the Designer. The green man quiver is by Miss Wu. The dubiously functional armour I'm wearing was inspired by that from the film King Arthur.

The warpaint swirlies are drawn by The Slander Rat (of Slander Rat Crafts). She appears here as a Merrow with green fishy.

The black hooded coat (£75), fey daggers (£15), fey swords, tooled vambraces (£40) and the intricately tooled quiver (£140) can be bought from Character Kit. The Forest Cloak (£75) also makes an appearance. The spear is utterly ancient and has been tipped and repaired so many times that it's really only good for being in photos for this blog.

More photos of the Navarr under the cut.

Miranda and Layout Update

Been playing about with photoshop and I've desecrated Waterhouse's Miranda by smooshing it with a photo we took of the Pillywiggen in the kirtle.

In other news, the blog has had a redesign and apologies for any wibbliness this may cause to your browsing experience. Also, many of the older posts are probably not happy with being viewed at this width. I know about it and it should be fixed... eventually.

Dr Watson's Costume from "Game of Shadows"

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I was watching Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows at the cinema the other week and happened upon Doctor Watson's costume in a glass case. Out came the camera phone and here are the few snaps.

Jenny Beaven reprises her role as costume designer (there's a nice little interview with her in the wake of the first film on frocktalk). Clothes on Film also did a Q&A with her and some commentary on the first glimpse costumes from the trailer.

The scarf (left) is particularly interesting as she says: The idea was that Mary had knitted it for him (Watson) and Holmes therefore absolutely hated it! I chose colours she would have thought he would like, and he loves it because she made it for him. 


The scarf seemed to have a journey of its own as it gets taken off, claimed by gypsies (etc) during the course of the film. Other fascinating costumes in the film for me were Holmes' disguises which seemed to have to be good but not good (tipping the hand to the audience). Irene Adler's gorgeous pink bustle dress and dark blue coat from the first film is reprised and all the gentlemen wear some very smart suits in various degrees of actual smartness


I suspect you'd probably get better detail of the dvd when that comes out, but I still thought it would be cool to quickly share this.

A closeup of Watson's costume under the cut.

Borrowed Costume: Xiao Long Nu

Yang Guo raised his head; he saw a white jade hand lift the hanging curtain, a girl entered. The girl wore an old fashioned delicate white dress, it was as if her body was covered with smoke and mist, she looked like she was about sixteen or seventeen years of age. Apart from her black hair, her body was as white as snow [...] he thought that she was beautiful, but without comparison, exuding an icy and emotionless aura.

from Divine Eagle, Knight Gallant, Book One, Chapter 5, translated by "Noodles"

The white-clad Xiao Longnu is one of the main characters in Jin Yong (aka Louis Cha)'s Return of the Condor Hero (though it is more accurately rendered Divine Condor and his Heroic Companion or Divine Eagle, Knight Gallant, as per the online translation of the novel). She is quite possibly the one of the most iconic characters of wuxia, especially given some rather consistent costume design throughout the many, many adaptations.*

Xiao Longnu is the leader of sect, the Tomb of the Living Dead. She is cold and dispassionate, cultivating a martial art that discourages any outward expression of emotions since an early age. She is the mentor and lover of Yang Guo, the non-avian titular character. The taboo nature of their relationship and their struggles with the disapproval of the pugilistic world fuels most of the plot, though the Mongolian invasion forms the backdrop to the story.

She is in many ways an archetypal Lady of War, being both hard as nails and characterised by her almost inhuman grace (she sleeps balanced on a tightrope). She can practically fly through her knowledge of the art of lightness and is, I believe, inspiration for many of the subsequent iterations of the trope in wuxia. That said, Jin Yong did largely found modern wuxia as a genre.

Divine Eagle is the second book of the Jin Yong trilogy, though it stands well enough alone. Depending on how you count (that is, if you exclude a certain slew of spin-offs made in the 90s), Divine Eagle is the most adapted of Jin Yong's wuxia novels. Like anything that has been extensively adapted, fans debate about which version was the best. The '06 version is probably the most accurate in the details and extravagant in production values (this fight is beautiful), though the '83 with Andy Lau and Idy Chan is probably the most beloved in Hong Kong. The anime is probably the most approachable since it periodically broken up by "footnotes" explaining the many of the underlying conventions of the genre (such as qi, qinggong and pressure point strikes aka Touch of Death). The internet is also rife with comparisons on Xiao Longnu's various incarnations in the serials.


More than any of the other novels though, Divine Eagle is a love story, or love stories, even, as most of the characters are motivated by love. The Scarlet Immortal is primarily motivated by her deep hatred of her ex-lover (the book opens with her slaughter of his entire remaining family). The feud between the Taoist Quanzhen ("Complete Truth") Sect and the Tomb of the Living Dead come about due to the extremely repressed romance between their founders. Passionless Valley even has a poison that kills you when you think of the one you love.

Some of the plots do seem overwrought and melodramatic to the modern eye, and for a genre that is often sold on its fights, there is a lot more going on (and early tv adaptions certainly did not have the budget for hugely elaborate fights). Questions of the rejection of society (and societal judgement), the price of honour and patriotism come up. And, of course, as the frequently quoted poem asks: "What is love?" (Which makes it really very good inspiration for anyone seeking to run an Exalted game.)

The outfit is based predominately on the outfits worn by Liu Yifei in the 2006 version. It consists of three layers: a white sleeveless inner dress, a short lacy cross-collar top with long sleeves ending in lace cuffs and a large white robe. There is also a wide lace sash that is then secured with a white cord. Both this and Xiao Long Nu's costumes in the 2006 serial are quite interesting in how its very much it is a fusion of modern materials and ancient styles. Lace of the sort used for her cuffs, for example, was certainly not known in the Song dynasty. One of her variant outfits also features white cloth "petals" over her breast and some lovely white-on-white embroidery on her over robe.

Though we didn't make this costume (see here for the full story behind the shoot), it is possible to commission something like it (or something closer to any of the original Xiao Longnu robes from the various serials) from the Costume Mercenary. Email us for more details. Also, Character Kit sells an excellently weighted 38" larp-safe Chinese Jian (£50).

More photos of me pretending to be Xiao Long Nu under the cut.

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* For those who have seen Kung Fu Hustle, Xiao Long Nu is revealed to be the name of the formidable Landlady (and Yang Guo, her husband). They appear in the subtitles as "Helen of Troy" and "Paris", which isn't quite the same.

My uncle's response to seeing these photos was an exclaimed "冷如霜" (literally, "cold as frost", a paraphrased quote from the novels).

Needless to say, cosplaying her is really rather vain.

Preview: Borrowed Wuxia Costumes in the Studio

This was more or less an exercise in vanity and cosplay. I had the opportunity to dress up as Xiaolongnü, elegant, indifferent and hard-as-nails heroine of Jin Yong's Return of the Condor. I also got to play around with most of their costume rack (which included many other fascinating costumes not appearing in these photos).

There isn't a terribly big market for wuxia, much as I've been using many of the elements in designing elven costumes. It's just not a genre that necessarily translates to live roleplay very well, though the Designer and I do have some notes and plans (nothing concrete). That all said, I did enjoy playing around with giant sleeves and flowing robes. We should have more of that, just generally.

What was rather amazing about the experience was watching the stylist do my hair: it's not a wig. She swiftly and efficiently built the whole coiffure out of my hair, additional braids, other extensions and, of course, various hair ornaments.

Due to these being studio photos done by a professional photographer, they have been tinkered with, that isn't actually a bamboo forest (unlike with the scholar and red robes shoots at the Durham Botanical Gardens, which is odd to think I was actually in China this time) and there is an utterly excessive amount of make-up on me. 

I suspect I'll write more on the actual characters being portrayed in the individual posts, though I can't say I'm not a little embarrassed at comparing myself to characters famous for if not defined by their beauty (the photo on the right being an impression of Yang Guifei). But as said, this is largely an exercise in vanity, and if we ever do end up running that wuxia live roleplay system, I suppose we've got some publicity shots on file.

Also, if you're seized by a sudden desire to own a larp-safe Chinese Jian, Character Kit offer an excellently weighted 38" one for £50.

Commission: Zevran's Leather Armour

Another commission with strong influences from Dragon Age: Origins, though this time the light leather armour for a Zevran Arainai cosplay. It's also done by Julie Knox, she of the Morrigan's Goatskin Skirt, the Oriet armour and the Monster Pauldrons.

Due to the person who commissioned this not wanting it any more, you can purchase this very set of armour for £180. Aside from looking like Zevran, it may be useful for Profound Decision's Odyssey: the Great Game.

Making something that was never designed to exist in the physical realm functional and wearable was quite a challenge for Julie. Rendering human-looking elbows and knees is quite tricky, even for the highly complex graphics departments of today.

After a lot of squinting, we realised that the armour (and many of the other models in Dragon Age) was designed to purposefully obscure the joints with thick "padding" so as to no need to accurately render elbows and knees. However, such padding on human joints would make them uncomfortable, if not highly awkward to move.

Very few of the characters in Dragon Age bother wearing anything under the armour and again, this made doing the photos rather awkward. Again leather on skin isn't exactly very comfortable. In the end, we used the basic eyelet shirt under it and our model got to keep his trousers.

We didn't really have any conveniently blonde, long-haired men around, though the Designer did suggest that all we really needed to complete the Dragon Age look was to splatter our model with a bottle of fake blood.

As always, the swords are from Character Kit. They're a little small, strictly speaking, to be swords from Dragon Age, but the perspective seems to make up for it a little.

This very set of armour (roughly a men's size medium, drop us an email) is available for £180.

More photos of the Zevran leather armour under the cut.

Prototype: Naval Coat

The naval coat is made from dark blue wool fully lined in a thick white cotton. It's a coat with a good, very solid weight to it. There are two flap side pockets and two hidden pockets. This is much more of an officer's coat, rather different in colour and style to the Portuguese uniform a few weeks ago.

We're not entirely happy with the coat as whilst it's correct to have the pockets firmly to the side, it does rather make them somewhat inconvenient to use. There's also finite use for a coat that doesn't close in larp.

It'd probably be good for an Admiral James Norrington cosplay if one rolled it in the mud enough.

The coat is worn with a dress shirt that is the model's own and the white linen fall-front trousers are available by commission from the Mercenary at £15.

To commission a coat in similar materials would cost in the region of £140-150. The prototype is available for £135 and you should be able to buy it from the website in a few days. The impatient can simply drop me an email.

More photos of the commodore's coat under the cut.

Commission: Morrigan's Goatskin Skirt

This skirt is made from leather and goatskin. It was commissioned as a cosplay piece for Morrigan, the witch of the wild, is a mage from Bioware's computer roleplay game Dragon Age: Origins.

Her character design has changed significantly from her concept art to here appearance in the Sacred Ashes trailer to her actual in-game model. Her skirt appears rather softer and more tentacular in its earlier incarnation, not to mention the dramatically different shirt.

This goatskin skirt is based predominately off this piece of concept art. The in-game model wears a much neater version, with the dropped belts being much more rigid and regular. The much messier, organic look of the concept art works far better with reality. It did, however, take far more belts than originally thought.

It was only the skirt that was commissioned from us, but for the purposes of these quick photos, Julie did throw together a red cowl and deployed an eldritch spear to complete the look.

A set of leather armour for the character Zevran was also commissioned. We may get some photos of that eventually, perhaps even, the new owners willing, some at the convention they're going to.

To commission a similar skirt would cost in the region of £150, though this may fluctuate depending on the cost of materials used.

A few more photos of morrigan's skirt under the cut.

Prototype: Cavalry Armour

I've already remarked upon the Elizabeth I: The Golden Age overtones in the preview post, the coincidence of having a red-head and plate armour in a photoshoot. Perhaps not unlike our Unintentional Agatha Heterodyne Cosplay.

The armour is made from stainless steel and is modelled after medieval cavalry armour. It was a prototype piece as Julie Knox was working out how to work make plate armour.

I'm afraid Julie has utterly foresworn ever working with steel, but if you fancy commissioning some custom leather or latex armour (like or unlike the Oriet), do drop us an email.

Also seen in the photos is the beautifully detailed Mysdanael Short Sword, available from Character Kit for £80.

More photos of the cavalry armour under the cut.

Steampunk Dress: The Unintentional Agatha Heterodyne Cosplay

The Copper Steampunk Apron-Dress is very much the old Steampunk Dress with a colour shift. It largely came about when the Mercenary stumbled upon a number of beautiful chunky copper buckles and d-rings and thus really wanted to use them in a garment.

The gaslamp fantasy influences from Girl Genius are rather more pronounced in this set of photos, largely due to Kathed's resemblance to Agatha Heterodyne. The urge to have her shout For Science! persisted throughout the shoot.

The Steampunk Dress is not based on any specific outfit's of Agatha's (though perhaps it's something she might wear). It's genesis is rather rooted in a buckle skirt owned by Gracewing that inspired the Designer to draw the Steampunk Skirt. Some sketches later, he arrived at this. The earlier prototype bore the iconic colours of green and brown, but due to the copper buckles, we opted for a slightly different colour scheme.

The Steampunk Dress is made from dark brown faux suede and dark blue wool. It has a number of copper d-rings and buckles and is trimmed with copper-braiding (if we had this to do over, perhaps we can fit more buckles onto the back of the bodice next time). The straps are fully functional and allow for the skirt (and its lining) to be hitched up. The pockets and test tube holders are not as numerous as those on the Steampunk Coat, but can still be handy for the gentlewoman inventor. The shirt is the model's own and the test tubes are courtesy of a free cycle. The clockwork key pendant is secretly a novelty bottle opener on a chain and the goggles are, as always, the beer goggles. Also appearing in the photos are a brass tube of tiny screwdriver heads.

The photos were taken by Durham's Palace Green, specifically by Durham Cathedral and The Pemberton Rooms of Durham University (not quite Transylvania Polygnostic University). The shoot was in the middle of Kathed's extremely busy day of directing Shellshock! (Go see them at the Edinburgh Fringe!), writing a dissertation and arranging a thousand other things. I am more than slightly grateful to Kathed for taking the time out to do these photos between lunch and more rehearsals.

To commission a similar dress from the Mercenary would cost in the region of £120. This pre-made Steampunk Dress, is, however available at the discounted cost of £105 at Character Kit.

More photos of the Steampunk Dress under the cut.