Category Archives: Embroidery &Mixed Media Art

Halloween Doll Custom: OOAK Bride of Frankenstein!

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I made a fabulous gothic burlesque outfit for my Bride of Frankenstein doll!Suzanne Forbes Sideshow Bride of Frankenstein custom

Suzanne Forbes Sideshow Bride of Frankenstein customSuzanne Forbes Sideshow Bride of Frankenstein custom doll corsetI just finished this project barely in time for round one of our Halloween week celebrations, and I am so proud of her!

This is a Sideshow Collectibles Bride of Frankenstein that i’ve had for like a decade.

I originally got her mostly for her laboratory accessories, for my dollhouse laboratory.Suzanne Forbes action figure dollhouse laboratory

Young Elsa Lanchester Burlesque RevueI loved her face, but the slightness of her base figure model and her outfit, though very screen-accurate, bored me. Elsa Lanchester is just much more fierce.

I wanted to reference Elsa’s dance training, the cabaret and Victorian numbers from her burlesque revue days.  Elsa and Madeline Kahn had so much in common as performers, and yet you only see a glimpse of it in “Bride of Frankenstein.” Elsa plays Mary Shelley as well, at the very beginning of “Bride”. Percy Shelley calls her “an angel”, and the devil is the corner of her mouth as she smirks, “You think so.”

Sideshow Collectibles Bride of Frankenstein Doll or action figuremadeline-kahn-young-frankenstein

 

I always had the idea I’d do a custom outfit for my Sideshow Bride, something sassy and exciting.

As I began to make my Horribella dolls, I amassed tiny doll-making trims and miniature buckles.Suzanne Forbes Sideshow Bride of Frankenstein custom doll corsetSuzanne Forbes Sideshow Bride of Frankenstein custom doll corset

Suzanne Forbes Sideshow Bride of Frankenstein custom doll bootsI got stuff from model horse tack suppliers Rio Rondo (boy, don’t try to load that site on your phone!) and BJD clothing-making suppliers all over the world.

I got amazing tiny silver leather trim from a handbag company in Los Angeles. I saved every bit of ribbon from every bag of fancy cookies, every inch of silver elastic from a dress tag, for my Snow Queen project (reveal next year!). For my mermaid doll and my corset customizing projects I got a zillion different kinds and sizes of Swarovski crystals, beads, sequins and chains.

I learned how to bulk out the hips of a figure and smoothly sculpt them with epoxy clay when I was making the tiny doll corsets for my Horribella dolls.

I give them big curves to match the silhouette of a Modern Edwardian underbust, my own favorite corset style. Then I draft a tiny corset pattern and cut and glue a miniature corset over them.

Suzanne Forbes custom doll corset

Suzanne Forbes Sideshow Bride of Frankenstein custom

Now that my workshop is complete, I keep powering through long-awaited projects.

So I finally made my Bride of Frankenstein Gothic Burlesque Elsa Lancaster Showgirl!

Isn’t she marvelous?

 

Beadwork in Progress- Halloween crazy quilt mantel scarf and leaf corset.

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Halloween spider bead embroidery by Suzanne Forbes 2016When we got back from the US last week I yanked the box marked “Halloween Craft Projects” off the shelf and tore into it.

Halloween spider bead embroidery by Suzanne Forbes 2016I was basically crazed from exposure to American craft store Halloween displays.

The first thing I wanted to work on was beading this mass-market Halloween mantel scarf or banner that I bought at PierOne during an after-Halloween sale for my usual 75-90% off.

This is what I call an “Uplift” project, after the science fiction novels by David Brin.

I have never beaded anything as fast in my life as I did this project.

I love taking commercially made items that I bought for almost nothing and investing hours of meticulous labor in making them more beautiful.

Halloween spider bead embroidery by Suzanne Forbes 2016It’s obviously fraught to buy mass-produced items in the first place; I always think of the person who made them.

I wonder how my buying these items at the end of their retail life, when they have basically become junk in the eyes of the retailer, impacts the commercial production cycle in other countries of Halloween crap for American consumers.

Halloween spider beadwork and beaded leaves by Suzanne Forbes 2016I don’t know the answer, but I do feel a connection when I do this, like my labor and the mystery factory worker’s labor is of equal value.

As if by adding hours of my highly trained privileged-artist love-labor to their object of work, I’m giving it more space in the world. A better chance of lasting.

As you can see I’ve also been working very slowly on the beaded leaf corset project.

I made the perhaps injudicious decision to individually bead some of the velvet leaves. And hand apply glass hotfix rhinestones to them. Heaven only knows how far I’ll go down that rabbithole.

I have an Instagram now, where you can see the delightful loot haul of green beads and crystals I recently obtained for the leaf corset!