Beading and Beetles--Embroidering the Game of Thrones King's Landing Dress!

From the start, I knew I didn't want to make a recreation of a dress, rather I wanted to make a dress that if I turned up in King's Landing, would fit in. We see enough of this style to get a feel for it. One thing I noticed while looking at different dresses was the embroidery had a great deal of texture. With that in mind, I decided on beading highlighted with metallic thread and beetle wings. While certainly not the level of detail on one of Cersei's dresses, it is similar to the amount of detail on Sansa's dresses in this style. I talk a little about the design itself and how I transferred it to the dress in this post.

And now, what I used for the embroidery. Beetle wings that I bought on eBay. This link takes you to the seller I used, although they don't seem to have any in stock right now. Search for beetle wings or elytra to find them. Most of them are in Thailand, where they're a byproduct of the food industry, so a little advance planning is needed! And while there certainly is something of an eww factor, they're really no worse than silk! Or so I told myself. A few minutes into working with them, and I was pretty much over that. I have a friend who's also working on a beetle wing dress at the moment. You can see her blog which includes a little historical information here, Where When Why.

I used the Benton and Johnson #371 wire in antique gold from Hedgehog Handworks for the running stitch along the beads. I've included a picture of it below. Though this is called a wire, it really isn't. It's a thread (cotton, I think) core with a metallic thread wrapped around it.

I used the Delica glass metallic bronze beads from Fire Mountain Gems. These are very nice beads, and do the job of imitating metal quite well. I also used these in silver on my Victorian knitted star bag. They fit over my size 10 sewing needles quite nicely! The cream colored beads between the beetle wings are Mill Hill from my local embroidery shop.

Now, onto the details!

Transferring Embroidery to a Somewhat Finished Dress

I decided to do the embroidery on my Game of Thrones dress after doing most of the construction. I wanted the embroidery to go over seams, and while that's possible do do with careful marking, I almost always have to adjust the shoulder seams from my muslin to the finished dress. It's just the way different fabrics behave! So, a different plan was in order.


First, of course, I drew my design onto paper. I traced the bodice pattern shapes and then drew in the design. My swirly pattern is based on the leaf design that I drew all over every notebook from junior high through college (miles were drawn during my one-on-one Russian history class alone), and then rather heavily influenced by Cersei's pink dress. In other words, my vines and the round shape of her swirls. Each little swirl is going to end in a two petaled beetle wing flower.

I then traced the design onto muslin with a Sharpie.


The next step was to pin the patterns into place. Try to avoid your design area as much as possible. I ended up having to move the red pin on the lower right.


Continue around the dress, matching lines as you go. I found the arm of the couch very helpful in doing this. The curve of it made it easy to lay the dress flat.


While I've previously used a window as a light box, that obviously wasn't going to work here. Just like pinning it, tracing it required curves. So, I took a round Pyrex dish and my cellphone--instant light box!



Everything shines through very nicely!

And the traced design! I used a regular pencil. My usual mechanical pencil was too sharp for the washed taffeta. Now, to bead the lines, sew running stitches near them, swirls behind them, beetle wings to the ends of the swirls, beads for stamens between the beetle wings...

An Unusual Embroidery Transfer Method--Or, A Little Creativity!

I recently had way too much fun with a little project I'm working on and decided I might as well share my make do technique for it. One of my upcoming projects is a King's Landing style dress from Game of Thrones. I'm not doing a reproduction, but rather designing my own. This led me to the perfect house for me--House Caron--and its sigil, a nightingale and words, No Song So Sweet. I've ordered a locket with a bird and decided I needed an embroidered bag as well. I'm sure I'm not the only one who occasionally needs a new project right now? In the middle of working on my pink cotehardie, and making sure I wouldn't reach my self-imposed deadline, I decided I had to embroider that day. I had thread (meant for a pinball), yellow silk (leftover from my Eugenie dress), and my self-imposed deadline is weeks (or possibly months, depending on how I want to wear it) before I need the dress. I even had an adorable bird to copy from Fashion in Detail from a 17th century embroidered smock.

One problem? No printer ink. And not enough artistic talent to draw the bird freehand.

I wasn't about to let that stop me though. So, here's what I did.


I took a picture of the bird and opened it in Photoshop Elements. I then darkened the outline of the bird using the paint can tool so that it was dark enough to trace directly from the computer. Then I zoomed it to a size I liked, placed paper over the screen, and traced in pencil. Alas, I have no picture of actually tracing the screen :)


Next, I taped the tracing to a window and put another paper over it so I could trace it in ink. I could've traced the pencil copy in ink, but I decided this was easier in case I messed up I'd still have the original.


Then I wrote the motto and taped it back to the window, and taped the silk over it. I then traced the bird, repositioned it over the writing, and traced the writing.


And the finished tracing! It's done in mechanical pencil.


And the finished embroidery! It's just stem stitch in Au Ver au Soie Soie d'Alger. Now, to decide what I want the bag to look like!