Female Jedi Costume Tutorial

Star Wars! Jedi! Sith! Lightsabers! Harrison Ford!  Who thought we'd get another Star Wars movie after the *gulp* prequel trilogy?  And that it'd be good??  Well no matter what, you'd better believe I went in costume!  For this particular premiere I dressed as a jedi in shiny material.  So, without further ado, here are the important parts!

The Vest Type Dealio

I found some really cool concept art that I liked, and it could just be the drawing, but it looked like she was wearing something shiny and I found some AWESOME fabric on sale, and therefore I chose to become a shiny jedi and mix my nerd references.

(I do not own this image.)

I ended up mixing patterns on this one, and probably shouldn't have?  I use a question mark because I'm still not sure.  I should have just stuck to my favorite pattern in the world and not messed around with another one, but I did.  The new pattern seemed to lend itself a little better.  I was mostly incorrect because I hacked away at what I made anyway.  And as per usual, the "finished" product did not fit the way the package said it would.  But without further ado, here's my latest adventure in shiny, stretchy material.
I combined the following two patterns:

(Of course this pattern.  Because this pattern.)

I used two because I liked the style of the first pattern, but wanted the length of the second. Therefore, I used the second pattern as a guide to lengthen the first.

First I laid out the first pattern's pieces as instructed by the instructions.

I added about an inch and a half as seen by the pin at the bottom of the pattern because I have a long torso and often need an extra inch.  Lengthen or do not lengthen to your pleasure.  Then, I laid the corresponding pattern pieces of the second pattern over the top to see the length of the second second in relation to the first and pinned to where the second pattern piece ended as seen below.

(Clearly a few inches longer.)

Then I made a line of pins to the longer point.

(You can see the pin lines of a couple extra inches to make the finished vest longer.)

From there I cut out and sewed the pieces together as instructed except not sewing up the back or the front.

(Shown with pins in the arm hem.)

Before sewing up the back I decided how much I wanted to cut off since I wanted a deep v in the back and in the front so my shirt that I worked so hard on would show!

(View from the back so you see how far I cut down.)

I also had to take in the shoulders and back a bit.  Make sure you measure this before you put in the little cap sleeves! I did not and definitely should have! 

Lastly, just a closing on the front!  I just sewed on a few snaps.  You could also use velcro if you want.  Then I took a spare piece of fabric and tied it around as a belt.

Shirt

(Sorry for the tan on tan.)

Since jedi always seem to wear wrapping garments and I have nothing like that I was forced to make my own.  And since using as pattern has recently gotten me down, I made one up!  My best plan? Possibly not?  But it turned out looking pretty good!  Here's my process:

The fabric I used was the same as my jedi robe, it's a gauzy, thin fabric.  Get at least 2 yards.  I wanted my garment to flow a bit more than it did because I ran out of fabric.

(I found it at Joann's for about 4 dollars a yard.  Excellent.)

Lay out your fabric and grab a fitted shirt of your own and lay it down flat.

(No need to have the fabric doubled.)

Since Jedi have more of a tunic than a shirt, I allowed much more fabric at the bottom of my shirt, so it would go down to my thighs.  Cut out the around your shirt, ignoring the sleeves, and allowing for it to be longer.  This will be the back of your shirt.

(It looks like an awkward dress thing at the moment.)

Now we'll add on the front.  It's an open shirt in the front, allowing for you to wrap it around yourself, so you'll need two side pieces.  Lay the back piece on another larger piece of fabric and pin along one side as seen below.

Then, you'll want to cut from where the shoulder meets the neckhole at an angle and down.  Repeat on the other side by pinning the other shoulder and side to another piece of fabric.  My amount of fabric was not what it should have been in large pieces, so I had to add more which I'll go over in a second.  These pieces that you cut should look like large, wide strips, widening toward the bottom, like the back piece.  Sew these at the shoulder and down the side.  It should look like a weird looking vest currently.

Next you'll need to cut out some sleeves.  My sleeves are a tad short, but that's okay since I am going to wrap my forearms with leftover fabric from my robe.  Measure around the armhole to determine the top of your sleeve.  On a double layer of fabric make a bell curve of that measurement in pins.

The picture shows half the bell curve since I just folded it over in the middle to keep it even.

Then measure around your wrist or forearm to determine the width of the bottom of the sleeve.  Make a line of pins from the bell curve to the bottom of the sleeve in the correct length of the sleeve.  To find this, simply measure your arm.

(You can see where I marked the middle to fold it in half.)

Cut out your sleeves and sew up the sides and into the armholes of your vest/almost shirt.

Now for me, I grossly underestimated the amount of fabric I need in the front (I recommend actually measuring instead of guessing), so I had to add a strip to one side.

(I added a few inch wide strip to the right side.)

(You can easily see the strip I added.)

Make sure you add enough to actually wrap around yourself.

And that's it!  I added snaps in two places so that the shirt would stay in place under my vest.

(Aw snap!)

I know, I'm not funny.

Leave the bottom of the shirt a bit open so it can wrap nicely around you.

Pants

Now here it totally depends on the look you're going for.  Loose pants to go with your loose fitting jerkin and robe?  Great, basically make pajama pants.  Did you instead find some concept art you liked and are attempting to follow but not really?  Great, buy some pants or make some pants.  I made some pants!  I used the same pattern I've used in the past for my Black Widow costume, but attempted to make them a bit bigger since they were very tight last time.  Well, they're still very tight. But they'll still work!

(I used the simple I-am-leggings version.)

This pattern is super easy.  It's two pieces.  That's it.  Sew 'em, add some elastic.  Put them on.

Robe

Every good Jedi has their robe because frankly, they're super comfy and flow-y, which I like.  The robe is the first thing I made, and you can find a ton of tutorials online.  You can find mine here: Jedi Robe Tutorial. I made mine in an afternoon.  I also made a tiny one for a 4 month old baby, but that's another story entirely.

Boots

Oh hooray, the shoes.  So often the easiest part!  Grab some brown boots.  Boom.

Lightsaber

Okay THIS is the best and most important part!  A Jedi needs his or her weapon!  My lightsaber that I'll be carrying to the premiere is an ultrasaber that I bought at comic con this past May and I adore it. If you don't have an ultrasaber or don't want to buy one, don't sweat it, there are tons of cheaper options at toy stores.  But if you want one you can actually duel with, and let's be honest, that's the whole point, then I suggest an ultrasaber, or making one out of similar materials.  Here's the method I used for a second lightsaber that I made: maglite lightsaber build.

(My ultrasaber.  The color is arctic blue.)

(My homemade one for comparison.  It's actually red, but it turned out orange in the picture.)

Hair

Good lord just pull it back!  I hate long hair that's always in the way in a fight scene.  Or should be and somehow never seems to impede fighting capabilities.  We all know that would not be true unless you were whipping your hair all over the place.  One day a superheroine is going to wear her hair back in a ponytail and I'm going to cheer.  Yeah I'm looking at you, every female superhero ever. Sorry, end rant.  I attempted to do hair like Leia's on Endor.  But I quickly learned that my hair is not nearly long enough or think enough for that nonsense.

All Done!

Hurrah!! You're a jedi now! Below I've included some other pictures of my finished costume.

Hurrah!