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A favourite Costume College moment (and a preview of my gala dress!)

There were SO MANY wonderful  moments at Costume College this year, and I’ll be blogging lots of them, but for now I just want to share a little one that really shows how fun and fabulous the event is.

There is a tradition among many costumers of taking ‘shoe shots’: images of everyone standing in a circle, pointing their toes inwards and showing off their shoes.  I meant to take some, but forgot all weekend!  (I’ve definitely seen ones from other costumers from CoCo).

Very late at night on Saturday, at the absolute end of the Gala, I ended up talking to Molly of Avant Garb (who started the night in a near-perfect* Kaylee dress recreation!) and Meg of Nutmeg Sews**  about how amazing  everyone’s outfit was and which 1,000 dresses were our favourites, etc etc.  It was late, and we’d danced and posed and generally looked gorgeous  all night, so, without really thinking about it, we all ended up taking off our shoes and standing there in our fancy gowns and historical stockings.

The lovely Maria, who is in the Historical Sew Fortnightly, noticed our dreadful indiscretion, and  came up to tell us we needed a photo of the discarded shoes, as an actual accurate representation of what really happens at CoCo.

So the only shoe photo I got of the night is an un-shoe-ed photo!

Gala night at Costume College, thedreamstress.com

Maria even got a photo of my getting the photo!

Gala night at Costume College, thedreamstress.com

Meg’s shoes are by American Duchess, mine are my Nana heels, altered by me, and Molly’s, I think, are commercial.

And that’s CoCo!  Four women who had never met before that weekend laughing their heads off over discarded shoes at midnight, and being super excited and inspired by each other and the whole event.  Fantastic!

* And by ‘near-perfect’, I mean an almost exact replica, not imperfect!  It WAS perfect!

** Keep a watch out of her blog in the next few weeks for an update on her francaise dress.  She had a full  SHIP in her hair!

9 Comments

  1. Carol says

    You look swooningly elegant in your evening gown. Even taking a picture of discarded shoes.

  2. By that time of night (if I was still awake), I know I would be rather slap happy and would think it absolutely hilariously funny to take my shoes off and take pictures, but wholeheartedly join in.

    Sarah

  3. Adriana says

    It was lovely meeting you and I hope that you will come to CoCo again. I especially enjoyed your Fortnight in 1916 lecture. And thank you for the tip about the combinations underwear. Good to know!

    You looked absolutely beautiful on the red carpet. Pure glamour!

  4. It was wonderful to meet you! The un-shoe-ing was one of my favorite moments as well (mine indeed are from Nine West 🙂 )

    Every time I wash my kitchen knife (especially if it’s a few hours or the day after ahem) I will now think of your 1916 talk, and how glad I am to have a nice modern knife!

    • Molly, your Kaylee dress is spectacular. Every last detail is just perfect. Well done!

  5. You look gorgeous! I do hope you’re going to blog about your Gala dress when you get an opportunity.

    Also, the ship. Can’t wait to read the blog post about the ship.

    • If you hit the link that Leimomi posted you can get to my blog from there. Best $8 I ever spent! Though it’s a little worse for wear after an evening of frivolity.

  6. Claire Payne says

    How marvelous. I look forward to reading your CoCo blogs.

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