A frog prince and a couple of ugly step sister costumes

Ah-ha, finally!  Some costumes done for the musical production of Grimm.  Which opens in just over a week.  Having a minor panic attack right now.

For this production I was assigned, among other things, a jacket for the Frog Prince and dresses for the ugly step sisters.

For the frog prince, fairy tale sleeves and a bit of swingy flash was needed.  It's hard to tell in the picture but I've got gold trim around much of the edges.  It'll be pretty bling under the lights.  The jacket is a beyond recognition modification of a pirate's costume jacket from Simplicity.  You can't see, but there are two godets on the side seams and one in the back, giving it a nice fluid look when worn. From the pattern I've completely changed the neck, sleeves, length and closures.

Oh, and hey, my very first attempt at a frog closure.  Another one is probably needed but I'll have to tackle that later as there is much left to do for the production.

You may notice that the prince jacket isn't much of a prince shape, per se.  But that's what happens when you put a man's jacket on a woman's dress form.  You'll have to take my word for it, it's not quite as girly looking as it seems.

The cape is a heavy drapery material and I was worried that the jacket won't support it well but I ended up sewing it on anyway and lays well on the actor.

Here is the cape and the sleeves with the fluffy supports underneath.

Some detail.  I do love this jacket. 

For the step sisters, I picked up a couple of prom/bridesmaid type dresses from our costume vault.  Both were long, form fitting and sleeveless. 

To uglify the dresses, I decided to add huge sleeves and fussy, big bottomed bustles in not quite complimentary colours.  The idea was to make them want to be beautiful dresses but miss the mark.  Whaddya think?

The bustle on the above is not quite finished, just the clasps to add.  I decided to go with a simple finish instead corset lacing.  The bustle is a modification (and resizing) from this pattern here.  You may recognize it from the steampunk costumes I did for Alice in Wonderland.  Instead of a split back, however, like in the pattern, the ugly step sisters have fully bustles.

If you are curious, I can probably create a little tutorial for this style of bustle.

The other step sister dress is, of course, a not so lovely lavender and magenta combination.  The dress and bustle are just a bit too small for the dress form, so you'll have to forgive the gaps.

The sleeves were upcycled from the bodice of another garment that was probably created during the early '80s.  The sleeves were simply too frightening not to use.  Luckily I managed to find just the perfect fabric to coordinate for the bustle on the shelf at in the costume vault.

And, just for fun, a quick peek at the bustle support underneath.  To look at the bustles on the form, they don't seem too outrageous, but once you put a real person underneath, the bustle support rises into the air and gives the actress that decidedly, and appropriately, ugly step sister waddle to their walk.