Cosplay Fail: The Purse that Never Was

Most costuming blogs are all about showing you the shiny pictures, focusing on the successful cosplay that makes you gaze at your sad little sewing kit in despair. Here at Frenemy Cosplay, we believe that our failures can be someone else's learning experience. To that end, friends, here is the story of the time I tried to make a purse.

In the interest of limited funds, I decided that I would make my own place to put my shit for the con, rather than hunting around trying to find something that would match anything that Dr. Girlfriend has ever worn ever. In the interest of limited space, I decided that I needed one item for both costumes and that it needed to be more or less collapsible. So I had this great idea. I was going to make a reversible purse - Dr. Girlfriend pink on one side, Lady Au Pair purple on the other - and use stiff facing to make it keep its shape.

Did I have a plan? Yes. Did I know what I was doing? Hell no. Did it work? Well... it turned out looking like this:

I think I'll just let that image speak for itself.

However, the very same day that I created this abomination, I went to the thrift store in search of an unrelated costume piece and found this:

Vintage black vinyl handbag for one stinking dollar. That, fellow cosplayers, is what we call a SCORE.

The moral of the story, I think, is that sometimes you have to try and fail before you can find the right way to do something. An alternative moral might be that you shouldn't be taking costuming advice from me, since I can't put together a fucking purse.

Either way, it's a good story.

Happy sewing, fellow cosplayers, and remember your thrift stores!

-shadowen