Johanna Mason – Hunger Games: Catching Fire

Made for: Dragoncon 2014

Background: I thought this would be a fun costume to make; especially to be able to shoot in the Marriott Marquis in Atlanta where part of Catching Fire was filmed.

Journal Entries: Read more at my Johanna tag

Patterns Used:
Butterick 4377

Dress:
Take that pattern above with a grain of salt; at the end it was nothing like that dress LOL. I started on this back in Jan/Feb of this year, got the basics started, and then didn’t touch it again til July. I had completely forgotten/lost touch with what I was doing with it, exactly, so I took those basic pieces and recut them and redid parts, trying to make sense of it all!

Anyway – I found a lightweight metallic dull gold fabric that I used as the base – by the time I finished there were very few places you could see this fabric, though. I made the top of the dress as a basic bodice, cut across the chest, and lined it and boned it – it needed the boning to hold up the weight of the skirts without completely falling off (I also added hook and eyes to the shirt/dress to keep it in place). The skirt I added (backwards, because I didn’t like the way I’d cut the front from the pattern above) and left the seams open for adding the gores later.

I ended up with two shades of chiffon – a brighter yellow and a more khaki/pale tan colour. I dyed the tan chiffon more yellow and was pretty pleased with it, though I think I could have pushed it further and been even happier at the end. I draped the pieces of chiffon onto the bodice, hand stitched them in place, and cauterized the edges as I went. Once I had each of the pleated/draped sections in place, I went back through and stitched the pleats down. This was honestly the most difficult part of the whole dress – because what looked fine on my dressform then looked wrong on me. There were several sections I had to sew it in place while wearing it instead of doing it on my dressform.

After I got the top section finished, I cut the skirt pieces and attached them, then started making ruffles for the gores. I just powered through them, with my husband helping me cauterize them since I was running short on time. I attached all the ruffles to each gore pieces, then sewed the gores in place on the dress, and stitched the main skirt chiffon sections in place around them. Once I’d finished that, I went back through what was left of my chiffon and added it in strips to the skirt.

Shirt:
When I first started on this back in Jan/Feb, I was going to do the dress all as one piece, with the shirt attached. I changed my mine when I went back and recut the dress – the shirt became a separate piece. Every single piece of the shirt, with the exception of the zipper and some of the studs, was leftover materials. I had some soft tan faux suede leftover from Boushh that I used for the base of the top. Since I was pushing it so close to Dragoncon, I didn’t bother with “sliced cork” or whatever the real dress is – I had a lot of leftover leather that I cut into strips, painted, and glued onto the shirt.

The wrist and neckpieces are separate – I made them out of foam, painted, and with strips attached over the top. The neckpiece is reinforced with worbla, and snaps closed. Also added the chiffon piece to the end of the sleeve. For the studs, I found a card of 40 stick on jewelry pieces on the clearance rack at the hobby store for $2. That’s what most of them are, LOL. Some of them are nailheads I leftover from other projects, but I felt they were a tiny bit to large and used them sparingly.

Wig:
I originally bought this wig for Peggy Carter, but decided it was too dark – but then realized it’d be great for Johanna. I put it on a wighead, and pinned and sewed the hair into place to create the fauxhawk. It ended up being a bit too small for my head and thus really uncomfortable to wear, so that may be something I revisit one day.

Accessories:
I made the earrings out of clip-on earrings, gold leather and some chain – and then forgot to wear them at DragonCon. D’oh!!
My husband made the nail bracelet – we bought nails, cleaned them up, glued them onto a piece of worbla and painted it.
I had shoes I was modifying for it, but dropped them as the con approached and I had other things I needed to finish. I wore other costume boots with them – so maybe one day I’ll revisit those.

Final Thoughts: As rushed as this costume ended up being, I was pretty pleased with it at the end. It has a few issues, but I’m in love with the photos of it – just wish I hadn’t forgotten my earrings!

                       

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