This past weekend, my improv troupe, the Dandies, headed to C4: Central Canadian Comic Con in Winnipeg, Manitoba, to open for William Shatner with Star Trek improv. In true Andie fashion, I had to make some new Star Trek costumes for the event.
My inspiration for my costume was the dress uniforms from Star Trek: The Next Generation.
I have been feeling a bit body conscious lately and felt that the shape of my current uniform and these would not make me feel quite comfortable. So I adapted the look into a fit and flare dress with a wrap front and the gold trim. I chose M6887 as my base pattern and planned out my costume with that in mind.
I made flat pattern alterations and just cut right into my fabric since I knew the pattern already fit me well. The first step was to raise the neckline. I did this using M6696 and used the collar piece from that pattern for the costume. After raising the neckline, I took the center front and back and slashed for a yoke piece. I used the sleeve piece from my test version of the Auberley dress pattern since I knew that is was close to fitting. I made a 2 inch large bicep adjustment and narrowed the sleeve toward the cuff so it wasn’t a bell sleeve. I may have narrowed a bit too much since I like rolling up my sleeves and am unable to for this dress. For the back shoulder piece, I traced and cut a triangle from the sleeve head that matched with the yoke, added a seam allowance, and then topstitched the pieces on before putting in the sleeves. They *almost* match up. One side is off on each, but that can be solved by trimming off a bit of excess seam allowance before sewing the detail on. The dress has a wrap front and sew-on snaps are put in along the princess seams. I will be replacing them, however, with velcro tape since the snaps don’t really provide a very clean look. Because of the curved princess seam, they do show off some bumps and pulls that I don’t love and are a direct result of the snaps not being quite in the right place/matching up correctly. Velcro will make that a bit cleaner and take out all the guesswork. I will replace the snaps with velcro now. However, it being last minute and needing to pack meant that I just wore it as is all weekend.
My dress is made with blue polyester fabric (I got a huge bolt of this so expect to see many more things made with it), black cotton rayon, and gold lame bias tape.
For my husband’s jacket, my inspiration was Kirk’s admiral uniform from a few different movies.
I really wanted him to wear a jacket that was an homage to Kirk since we were meeting Shatner himself.
I didn’t make many changes from the inspiration for this except in very tiny details such as adding the black bias tape to trim the inside white panels or adding a thin gold strip on the sleeve above the cuff or on the cuff itself. It was a result of not enough time and realizing that it wasn’t really worth the trouble.
I used the same pattern as his Picard jacket, M7216, as the base for this costume. I lengthened the jacket by 7 inches and turned the fronts into a wrap style. I raised the neckline using the M6696 pattern, but for this one I finished the neckline with red bias tape using the twill from the body. Other than that, I only added a cuff, a white rectangle at the shoulder, a belt, and belt carrier at the back of the uniform. The white turtleneck underneath is a dickie using white rib material. I also made the belt buckle and cuff pips using polymer clay. The fronts are closed with snaps and the belt is closed with velcro.
This costume is made with red and white twill, black cotton rayon for bias tape and the belt, gold lame bias tape, and white ribbing.
In the pictures below, I made all the Star Trek uniforms that our troupe is wearing because I am freaking amazing.
We had a great time. Other than opening for Shatner, we got our first paid gig at a private birthday party and we had a show in a local board gaming cafe called After Dark. It was a great time for bonding with the troupe as well. Now for a world tour. Errr, after our monthly home show tonight. 😉
Other than that, C4 was a lot of fun. I got my picture taken with Mark Pellegrino who plays Lucifer on Supernatural.
And I got my picture taken with the first blade and an impala to round out my Supernatural love:
I saw some great cosplay.
Shatner is sad it’s over:
That being said, con exhaustion is a real thing. I didn’t get con flu, though, but I’m ready to sleep for the next week! Ha!
If you want to check out more from that weekend, check out the troupe facebook page here. Here is the wicked video of us singing Shatner on stage:
Laugh long and prosper!
Andie Wells Studio 
Reblogged this on The Dandies and commented:
Andie dressed us for the job we want!
❤
Hi Andie
Awesome costumes and I loved the video you posted (I’m sat here at 1am GMT and I woke the the dog laughing) I can feel your exhaustion just reading that post, what a busy lead up and a busy but obviously highly enjoyable weekend. So pleased that your troupe got the opportunity to do that and are getting paid work in the future. Being paid for what you love was, for me, a bit of recognition for the effort, time and practice I’d put in to get to the standard I was at. Doesn’t matter the art, it don’t come without hard work!
I will look at the Facebook page when I don’t need to go have my meds and go get some sleep 🙂
Stripey hugs… Now go rest up!
T x
Thanks so much, T! I’m glad you loved the video. 🙂 🙂
Getting paid for our art was a great experience. I think it really brought us together and made us realize that we should be doing more of that. 🙂
That looks like so much fun, and you did an amazing job with the costumes. I’m so impressed.
Thanks, Andrea! It was a ton of fun. 🙂
How cool that you guys got to open for Shatner! It was fun to watch the video. Your bit about the communicator badge was too funny! I love watching how your costumes have evolved over the various shows you all have done!
Thanks, Elizabeth! 😀 😀 It was so much fun performing for that group. 🙂