Peacock Costume

There's a resident peacock at Woodland Park Zoo who often shows up at the same time and location to present his feathers. The last time I saw the peacock's display, I thought that the moment right after he let down his feathers was so beautiful – it reminded me of an elaborate ball gown. So, that's where my costume idea originated!

I used:

• 125 peacock feathers from an online wholesale floral company
• 1 form fitting dress I found at a second hand store
• 1 very full, long skirt from a different second hand store
• 2 small packs of guinea hen plumage from Joann fabrics
• 1 piece of royal blue fabric (about the length and width of a scarf) from Joann fabrics.
• Royal blue glitter
• Head band
• Spray adhesive
• Hot glue gun
• Scissors
• Needle and thread
• Tin foil and masking tape
• Newspaper cuttings
• Flour and water

THE HEAD PIECE
I pressed tin foil around my head and put masking tape around the tin foil to help hold the shape. I then put vaseline in my tin foil mold and used equal parts flour and water, and some newspaper clippings to paper-mâché the inside of the mold. After the drying process I removed the paper-mâché from the tin foil, cut it to the shape I wanted, then covered it with spray adhesive and glitter. After the adhesive dried, I hot glued the head piece to a head band.

THE "BODY"
The form fitting dress I found was floor length. I left the back long, but shortened the front by picking up the dress at the knee and hand sewing it to the waistline. Unfortunately I had no luck finding a blue dress, so I covered the front with spray adhesive and blue glitter. I then hot glued the guinea feathers to the side of the dress near the outer thigh.

THE TAIL
I laid the full skirt on the ground and began hot glueing the peacock feathers onto the skirt. I started with the longest feathers and worked my way up from the bottom of the skirt to the waist. Then, I used scissors to trim any quills that stretched beyond the waistline, and hot glued my piece of royal blue fabric over the trimmed quills. After the glue set, I hand sewed the skirt to the back of my form fitting dress at the waistline.