Cosplay - to Buy, to Make, to Assemble?

As you possibly already know, I'm going to a Comic Con this year! I'm super excited to even be going, but mostly to decide what I'm going to wear! This post has been a few weeks in the making to be honest and even in that time I've changed my mind a hundred times. Originally our group was going to go to Comic Con in two different costumes, for the two main days. However over the last few days its been agreed that (largely due to cost) we're only going to do one costume, for one day. This is a massive help to me as I've always been definite on one of my costume ideas and have been struggling for a second.

So who am I going as for Comic Con? Regina from Once Upon a Time. More specifically, The Evil Queen Regina.

Source

I can't exactly explain why I want to go as Regina, since I definitely don't like some of the stuff she wears, but for the most part she is awesome and I would love to dress like her for the day. However with the "who" decided, its now to decide the "what" and the "where".

To Buy

I looked into buying a costume of Regina, straight out. I knew it would be expensive but a) it would probably look awesome and b) it would all just be simple and done for me. Sadly though, there aren't a lot of places that I've found which sell Regina costumes.

Costumes seem to vary, from one extreme to another.

This jacket above is for sale on Etsy, at a price of £76.36. It's custom made so any size etc. but its hard to tell how good it would be, as its on a mannequin and not on a person. However, aside from that its pretty good and all you'd need would be a corset style top and some leather trousers.

A middle of the road option, would be this blue dress below. At £351.27 its way out of my budget though and definitely not one of the Regina looks I would go for.

Finally, a beautiful copy of a Regina costume, but absolutely out of my price range. I don't entirely think it would suit me either but hey, if I had the money I might give it a bash!

None of these grab me and in which case I don't really want to part with my hard to come by cash. If it was one of the dresses or outfits below, then maybe I would be swayed!

To Make

Of course when I couldn't find something I liked, I considered making my own. After the last sewing incident, you'd think I wouldn't be in a hurry to do it again... but these things cross your mind regardless. I remembered seeing a pattern for Regina's costume, back when Nat and I were making our Shakespearean one so of course I went looking. As with most patterns, they're a fairly reasonable price but then of course that's not the part that gets expensive!

McCall's do a pattern, that is fairly easy to get your hands on. I think I saw a few on Ebay and a few on Etsy, some from this country and some from the US. From what I could see, you're looking around £8 for all three of these patterns together. Obviously from that point, you can decide which one you like most and make it.

When you go to Comic Con, there is definitely something about a handmade costume. People spend hours and hours making their costumes and I suppose it would be nice to say I made mine. But what if it goes wrong? What if it doesn't fit right? What if its so stressful I take the dress-making scissors to it with only a week to go! Not just that, but it actually ends up pretty expensive to make a costume like this. Along with obvious time its going to take to complete, where do you get the beautiful fabrics that make it look authentic? Are they even readily available?

I first considered making my own costume about 2-3 weeks ago and even then I thought it was crazy and could end up too time consuming. Now I'm 2-3 weeks nearer to the deadline and I haven't even started/decided yet! Would it even be possible?

To Assemble

After talking myself out of making a costume (though please note I'm not completely talked out of it as its an ongoing decision that I really should make soon) I decided to look for ready-made clothes that I could just assemble to look like Regina's costumes. I searched through Ebay for hours and this is what I came up with!

Now I'm not clothes or fashion expert, so I haven't even attempted to put any of these together as an actual outfit, however I'm sure I could figure something out from all these bits (or at least ones that are similar). Even better, some of the items start as little as only about £5 - though some of the jackets and skirts go up towards £80-£90. The concept of putting together already made clothes seems like a good one to me, if I can find the right stuff. The plus points are that I'll possibly be able to wear some of these pieces again, which obviously wouldn't be possible with either of the other two options. However, to really get the look, some of the clothes would definitely have to be the more expensive items. And then, when I have it all together, will it look right?

I really must make a decision ASAP but at least even writing this post has helped me to compile all the information and thoughts that I have!

What would you choose to do in this situation?