DIY Queen Esther Costume Uses Upcycled And New Elements
Isn’t our little Queen Esther just the sweetest? And honestly what I love about this DIY Queen costume (fit for a princess too) is not only the rich theatrical combination of colors, but the fact that my now 16 year old daughter wore that same “dress” as a part of a Queen Esther costume I made for her around 13 years ago! Now I’ll have to say, this version is much much nicer due to the use of a sewing machine and having a bit of practice under my belt.
Truthfully, sometimes being a pack rat pays off, at least in the costume department. (I’m now currently paying big time for the rest of my pack rat tendencies as I start to clean for Passover.) So dear readers, if you have an attic or an organized garage or a basement or all of these, certainly do save the very best pieces of clothing of all kinds to be used as costumes. I just put aside a fun skirt with huge red roses that my daughter never wore, and am dreaming of a Queen of the Roses costume, with the waist of the skirt forming the top of the dress, just as I’ve done here, with the addition of some ribbon straps. Got it? Okay, lets make a list of all the items you’ll need for this costume, thrifted and created, and hopefully this will inspire you to make your own amazing costumes!
One of my greatest pleasures is making costumes with items I have on hand, since there is no shortage of that! The only thing I purchased for this costume was the purple shirt, and that was only 10 shekels (($3)
Queen Esther Costume Items:
- 1 thrifted or handed down girl’s skirt in rich colors
- ribbon to match the color of the skirt
- long-sleeved or 3/4 sleeve shirt in a color to match the skirt, we purchased this purple one
- thrifted wedding veil to deconstruct (I glued on the purple sequins 13 years ago) or about 1/2 yard of tulle (I used this one for my daughters costume as well, but this time I reduced the volume by half)
- a be-jeweled headband
- a DIY fur trimmed costume cloak that you can make yourself, or a cape or cloak that you may have on hand
- some fur trim, mine came from a winter hat that I took apart (my daughter didn’t like it as there was too much fur, so yippee for us!)
- If you don’t want to glue the fur to something existing you can always just make a fur collar
- a huge costume jewelry necklace
How To:
- Hopefully the diameter of the little girl’s chest is not larger than the diameter of your skirt’s waistband, and so just sew or glue on ribbons to act as straps to keep the dress up. You’ll likely have to hem the skirt, which I did intially by hand, and now by machine.
- A crown can be very uncomfortable to wear for a toddler, so I recommend using a thick be-jeweled headband (which you can also make from a regular headband), and then simply glue the tulle or veil into the inside of the headband.
- Sew that gorgeous DIY costume cloak, or use my instructions to cut one from fabric that doesn’t unravel, and voila, a costume is born!
- Wow, now that I’ve listed it all for you it sure does sound simple, guess I’ll use my own advice when making more queen and princess costumes for this little one until she requests something else, which won’t likely be for another three or four years. Ah yes, she will likely request to be a bride, but I’ll try to convince her to be a queen, much more colorful!
