DIY Costume: The Corpse Bride

It’s here again… THE VERY BEST DAY OF THE YEAR! I don’t think I will ever chill out about Halloween. It’s like they created a holiday specifically for creatives who love to play dress up. And for that, I am forever grateful. Every year, I spend most of September and October brainstorming, thrifting and crafting up whatever costume I set my mind on (and the whole rest of the year deciding on one). It’s so fun for me to figure out how to make these characters come to life. I’ve had the Corpse Bride in the back of my mind for a few years now, but was nervous about executing the makeup. After my awesome experience using Mehron Paradise Paint last year for my Lisa Frank Costume, I felt much more comfortable going for it. Also, with this being the only Halloween we would be celebrating engaged, doing something wedding related seemed like a DUH moment. Today, I’m here to talk about how I gathered and created these looks to become Victor and Emily!

The Skirt: My first obvious thought was that I had to keep an eye out for wedding dresses while thrifting. You’d be surprised how easy they actually are to come across, so I was able to be pretty picky about what I had in mind. I eventually found a vintage lace ballgown with a “V” cutout front that seemed perfect for Emily, also… SCORE because it was $6! I took it home and right away chopped out all of the layers of tulle from underneath, then also cut the piece of pleated satin fabric that was sewed in to create an open front. The top was not similar to her dress at all, so I cut it off and just treated the dress as a skirt. I also trimmed the train of the skirt to look jagged and have holes like Emily’s in the movie. Because the train was so long, I sewed a little loop of elastic in the middle of the train so that I could bustle it on my wrist while actually wearing it out for the night #Practical. Next, I had to color the dress to match Emily’s blue ombre look. I tried a new technique that I hadn’t done before and basically hand painted the skirt with Rit dye. It was a little intimidating, but once I got into it I realized that it felt really whimsical and hard to mess up. Basically, I used the Kentucky Blue towards the bottom of the skirt, the Sapphire Blue towards the middle and also used some tea to add an aged feel to the white areas. It was actually really fun and relaxing to do. I mixed my dyes, laid a bunch of garbage bags on my living room floor, and painted on the skirt like it was a canvas. After that you just need to rinse thoroughly and let dry. For a one-time-wear costume like this, I would avoid machine washing the clothing so that the colors don’t run.

The Top: Because I trimmed the top of the dress off, my next step was to find a corset that I could add onto. I had a really hard time thrifting a lace white corset and also wasn’t thrilled with my options on affordable sites like Amazon. I ended up buying a very simple white satin $2 corset from a thrift store and then bought a yard of lace fabric. My mom helped me sew the lace onto the front of the corset (she’s a much better seamstress than I pretend to be). Next, I found some trim that seemed perfect to edge the corset with, but it was white. I used the same dye I bought for the skirt and dyed the trim on my stovetop for 30 min, let it dry overnight and hand sewed it around the top. After that, I used the dye painting technique I used on the skirt to “rough up” the top a little and add blues and yellows. For the “ribs”, I hand sewed on a patch of black fabric, stitched on some fingers that I broke off of a skeleton hand from the dollar store, and added the blue trim to top and bottom of the black patch.

The Veil: This was sort of a hot mess that turned into a pleasant surprise. I had my heart set on using some sort of drapery-type sheer fabric that had an embroidered pattern on it to replicate the swirls on Emily’s veil. This is the part of the costume I had put off the longest because I couldn’t find what I had in mind. Eventually, just a few days before Halloween, I ended up buying yellow curtains from Goodwill that I was not confident would work. I set them in a bucket of bleach and water multiple times with no luck, the last time leaving for 24 hours, until the color was FINALLY at least a very pale yellow. I gave up hope that I would ever get the curtain totally white, so I soaked it in a bit of the blue dye for 15 min or so to at least turn the color from a warm-off white to a cool-light gray. I ended up unintentionally getting a cool distressed/wrinkled treatment in the fabric from how much I had put it through (sorry, curtains!), and was really happy with the turnout. From there, I trimmed the bottom jagged, cut holes and used the same dye painting technique as the rest of the costume to create an ombre effect. After that, I made a halo from floral wire, threaded a string through the top pocket in the curtains to bunch them and sewed the top to the halo with fishing line. I then went around and added silk florals (make sure to buy during 50% week!), using floral tape to secure. The whole thing ended up being really heavy, so I also sewed a hair comb to the inside-back of the floral crown to secure on my head.

The Accessories: I made my bouquet from more silk florals and finished it off with lace ribbon and blue gauze. I made sure to add blue butterflies to both the crown and bouquet as a nod to the end of the movie where Emily makes her exit up to the sky in a cloud of butterflies. Pulling in small details like this is my favorite part of costume-making! And now for my favorite part of the costume, that FREAKIN DOG SKELETON PURSE. YOU GUYS. For anyone who hasn’t seen the movie, Emily gives Victor a (dead) dog named Scraps as a “wedding gift”. For Lisa Frank last year, I used a paint can to make a purse and the usefulness/quirkiness of it was my absolute favorite part. I knew I wanted to do something similar this year and was SO excited when I found this little skeleton dog on clearance at Joann’s. I bought a bamboo purse handle, painted it white and attached to the top of the dog with jewelry wire. I then wrapped an old clutch with leftover blue gauze from the bouquet, flipped it upside down so I would be able to actually get inside of it during the night and used the same floral wire to secure it to the inside of the dog. 😍

Hair/Makeup: I ordered this wig which was the perfect color and length for Emily’s hair. It was a little too curly and glam looking for her whole vibe, so after it came in the mail I roughed it up with a ton of dry shampoo and relaxed the curl with my straightener. For my makeup, I ordered 3 colors of Mehron Paradise Paint, Light Blue, Black and White. I used the black and white to do one arm and one leg as Emily’s “bones”. I could have definitely bought tights or an arm sleeve that looked this way, but in my opinion… that’s not nearly as much fun! I painted the rest of my body in the blue paint, then went in with blue and black eye shadow to contour the areas that would naturally have shadowing. I also went a little crazy with a highlighter to really add to her skeletal effect. I used a liquid liner to do my cartoon eyebrows, jaw cut-out and triangle nostrils. I finished it off with a pink lip and used fake lashes on top and bottom. For the bottom lashes, I added them right where my cheek bones started and filled in my under eye with the white Paradise Paint to create Emily’s wide eyes. I cannot say enough about this body paint, it really has made a big difference in my confidence doing costume makeup. It’s water activated, so if you “mess up” it’s super easy to wash away and when it dries it feels like skin. There’s no itch or discomfort like the cheap Halloween store paints. The one thing I will caution you on is that this blue paint was much more difficult to apply evenly than my orange paint last year. Since skin is naturally warm-toned, using cool-toned paints will show any imperfections or blotchiness really easily. Because of this, it took a longgg time to blot my entire body with a sponge and get the paint even.

Dillon’s Costume: Dillon’s costume was actually fairly easy to gather! I found his pinstripe pants, button up shirt, blazer, and vest all at thrifts. The vest was too cool toned, so I threw it in a bucket of orange Rit dye I already had at home to warm it up a bit and it made a big difference. I ordered the ascot tie from Amazon. For his makeup I used the white Paradise Paint, and then my Kat Von D contour pallet to add in his shadowing. We sprayed his hair with black costume hairspray and he even decided on his own to grow his hair out just for the costume… I think my Halloween dedication might finally be rubbing off on him!

This got real long, so I’ll wrap up quickly. You guys, this year’s costume was SO much fun. As you can tell if you actually read this to the end, it was super time consuming and required a lot of problem solving. I’m not going to sit here and pretend this was a quick DIY, that’s not what I aim for on this holiday. Halloween is my favorite time of year because it pushes me creatively and gives me an excuse to craft and thrift for weeks straight. Sitting on my living room floor with a glass of wine and a glue gun in hand truly is my happy place and because of that this time of year has always felt special to me. This costume really pushed me to try new things… I’ve used more fabric dye in the past 2 weeks than I have in my entire life. I am constantly my own worst critic, but I have to admit… I really, really love the way these turned out. 💖 Thanks so much for following along! And in case you’re wondering… yes, I AM already brainstorming for next year!!!

Xo Amanda