Costume Help

[ancestry]

I need some help and suggestions from my budget friendly disers.

May is biography month at my daughter's school and the students have to dress up like their person. Last year she was Anne Frank so finding a costume for her was easy to put together during a Salvation Army/Goodwill trip.

This year she is Abigail Adams. She needs to dress up as Abigail next Thursday, May 5th. I'm at a loss on how to do this costume.

Restrictions: I can not sew at all - not by hand and not on a sewing machine. Also, buying a costume online is out of the budget. I have about $20 I can spend on this.

Ideas?

 

[mrsbornkuntry]

I would look at the nightgowns instead of dresses, you might find something you could work with there

 

[njmom47]

Did you Google Abigail Adams images and see what type of clothing she wore? Even if you can't sew, that would give you some idea of what to look for. Do you belong to Freecycle? You could ask for a costume/dress on there, or maybe Craigslist. Do you know anyone from the drama department at school? Would they have anything you could borrow?

 

[xXMyTwoPrincessesXx]

You know, I always see victorian looking dresses at Marshals. You can try there and see.. they are usually $14-20

 

[daytripper75]

Laura Linney played Abigail Adams in an HBO special and she wore a tan cape with a straw hat. Do a google for a picture.

Add some fake flowers to a straw hat, pick up several yards of fleece (it won't fray!) cut a semi circle out of one corner and round the other three corners off then use two safety pins to add ribbon to hold it on to her shoulders.
She can wear a blouse and long skirt (a woman's skirt pinned to fit?) underneath.

 

[NotUrsula]

The trick about these "historic person" costumes for school is that you really need to emulate an iconic image in order to make the point. In Adams' case, there are essentially two iconic images:

The first one is the Blythe portrait done in 1766, age 22:

And the second, and much more well-known, is the Stuart portrait of her at age 56:


The second is the best for costuming, as the lace cap and the neck ruff are so distinctive, but the first look is easier to create with modern materials. Pull the hair straight back and into a bun at the nape of the neck, add a v-neck white blouse and a blue shawl -- and that triple strand of pearls. The hair, the pearls and the shawl are the three most important components of the image.

OP get yourself a bottle of FrayChek from a fabric store, and a yard of periwinkle-blue taffeta (sb easy to find during prom season.) Use the FrayChek to finish the edges of the fabric so that it won't ravel. Next, get some cheap costume pearls from a thrift shop (or a mardi gras bead bucket) and shorten them up into a 3-strand choker; you can just use a needlenose pliers to hook them to a craft-store clasp with some fine wire, or even tie them onto it. Do her hair to match, and you've got it. She can wear just about any full-cut thrift-store floor length skirt under it, because the top part is what matters. (Oh, and makeup -- ARCH her eyebrows up and do the "circle of blush" look; Adams wore it that way, as you can see. But no lipstick and no mascara -- not period.)

A month ago I had the joy of transforming DS into Dante Alighieri on two days' notice.