Tutorial: Cinderella 2015 Cosplay

If you’re like me then you totally fell in love with all the costumes in the new live action Cinderella movie! Lily James portrayed the princess perfectly! I knew right away that I had to have her dress in my life, but I was scared to take on such a project. Her dress is massive!! So with a little creativity I was able to recreate a version of that magnificent ballgown without breaking the bank. I realize I didn’t make a 100% screen accurate cosplay and I’m okay with that. I still felt like a princess wearing this! I’m hoping this semi-homemade tutorial will help inspire someone else that might want to make Cinderella’s gown. Enjoy!

This cosplay came to life the moment I found these prom dresses at JC Penney for $9.99. Yep you read that right! Originally priced at $250 – I noticed online it’s only on sale for $99.99 so I may have had really great luck finding these in the store for 10 bucks!! I couldn’t pass up on this deal so I took home two dresses and started deconstructing them. I took off the jewels at the top and cut one of the dresses completely in half. Then I simply reattached it to the other dress to give it more fullness.

I also added the extra petticoat from the first dress. Basically I just combined the two bottom pieces of each gown. And that’s it! It was a lot of dress to work with but was simple to sew. Now I had a fuller dress that was ready to wear. Well.. almost!

I stared at my dress and knew I was going to struggle a bit with the bodice. I’m not familiar with making my own corsets so I turned to The Violet Vixen! They offer a splendid collection of steel-boned corsets to choose from and a free sizing consultation to help you find the perfect fit. I decided to get the Misty Floral Brocade Corset in Classic White and paint it. The paint matched PERFECTLY and was much easier than using dye. It only took one coat and I could still see the beautiful details on the fabric. If you ever need a custom color I can’t recommend this corset and paint method enough.

The next step was to make the ruffle neckline. I bought a yard of extra tulle that matched the bottom of my dress and laid it flat on the ground. I layered it about four times and then stitched it together. Next I only attached it to the front center and back of my dress. I kept it loose because I planned to have it lay OVER the top of my corset. Finally, I gathered it in a few places and attached several butterflies and jewels I bought from Hobby Lobby. I kept mine simple, but you can add as many as you like. Looking back I do wish I had made the ruffles bigger.

For Cinderella’s hair I recommend using Arda’s Ferrari in Dark Ash Blonde. Normally I would say their Ferrari style is perfect as is, but mine seemed a little flat. I’ve bought this style 3 other times and always loved this wig so I am thinking I just got a bum one. Rather than return it, I just ordered some wefts in the same color and hand sewed them in. I also ordered the clip-in braid. Since the wefts are straight I had to curl them. Arda’s hair is heat safe – I used a curling iron at 280 F temperature. After I curled a section I pinned them and let cool completely before taking down. This made beautiful curls!

Underneath my dress I wore this petticoat from eBay. I would have liked to have used a bigger one, but I think it worked just fine. Also, I’m obviously wearing a nude undershirt (from WeLoveColors) because I wanted to hide my tattoos, but that’s totally optional for you!

Big thank you to April Miller for taking these photos!

A Cinderella cosplay wouldn’t be complete without a glass slipper!

My shoes are Walstar and I purchased them from Amazon. The gorgeous butterfly clip is from EnchantedCandy on Etsy. I absolutely plan on wearing these all the time now! They might be my favorite part of this whole costume! 😀

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Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo!

So that’s how you take an old prom dress and use a little magic to turn it into a beautiful princess gown! I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and find it useful somehow. Thanks for reading! 🙂

~Glitzy