One of our amazing instructors at The Sewing Room, Maria Chenut, spent a good deal of her Summer this year creating the costumes for the Marin Shakespeare Company's production of Don Quixote. She used a wonderful combination of repurposed materials and vintage clothing to create the costumes. What a talented instructor we have on hand!
One of my favorite pieces was the armor, made from dime store vegetable steamer parts and faux suede. Maria is very clever in her material and construction choices. You can read more about her entire process on HER blog.
"...The flexible armor was thought out to give Ron Campbell, who plays Don Quixote, the ability to do somersaults or whatever shenanigans he wanted. The individual pieces of vegetable steamers were separated, flattened, dulled, textured with light speckling of spray paint, sealed, and then layered in and sewn down among the faux suede fabric I had already cut into scale shapes, treated and sewn down onto a base of quilted material thanks to my trusty industrial Singer…" Maria Chenut
"....The helmet is meant to hide her face as she is not wearing a mask. The white strip is a piece from the belt I wove through her thrift store tunic and the vegetable steamers make nice eyeshades. These and the scallops around her neck echo Quixote’s costume." - Maria Chenut
