Costume Project: Part I

This past Halloween, I decided to wear a modern goth/vampire costume that was very different from the fun costumes I wore in this past. Because I really like how it turned out, I decided to use vampires as my inspiration for my final costume project. I must admit, however, that finding the right character to re-create the costume have not been an easy task. Because I wanted to shy away from the traditional vampire outfit, it took me awhile to find one that will look modern yet still possesses the classic vampire image and attitude to it. After searching through all the IMDB list of vampire movies, I saw the movie Underworld and remembered how my sisters used to like the film series. From that thought, I re-watched the Underworld movie trailers and got fascinated on the details of Selene’s (Kate Beckinsale) costume. After realizing that it will be fun to re-create her character costume, I started planning on how to make a male version of it that I can wear as my final project (and possibly next Halloween).

Before I start rambling on my ideas about how to re-create the costume, let me first discuss briefly the movie. Underworld is a 2003 action horror film directed by Len Wiseman, starring Kate Beckinsale, Scott Speedman and Michael Sheen. The film tells of the secret history of Vampires and Lycans, while the main plot revolves around Selene (Beckinsale)—a vampire Death Dealer hunting Lycans—and Michael Crovin (Speedman)—a human who got bitten by a Lycan. Packed with Gothic visuals and thrilling action scenes, the film grossed $95,708457 worldwide.

Wendy Partridge was the costumer designer for the film. Due to the nature of the lead character's work and the darkness of the film, Partridge decided to create a black, spy-like costume for Selena. The costume is mainly made from leather, allowing Beckinsale to look slick and move swiftly for her action scenes.








The top part of the costume is similar to a 17th century corset. Re-creating this top portion of the costume for myself, I decided that I will wear a long-sleeve button-down shirt with a black, silk tie. I believe that the formality men's top should be equal to the formality of the corset. I will also wear a long leather coat jacket, similar to Selene's. The thickness of the leather jacket should compliment the soft material of the button-down shirt.

For the bottom part of the costume, I will wear a pair of leather pants. I might need to buy a new pair because there is no available leather pants in the costume closet that I can borrow. Hot Topic is the brand the comes to my mind whenever I think of leather clothes, so I will go visit the store this coming weekend.

For my footwear, I will match Selena's boots with a pair of 7-inch leather boots that I found in our costume closet. I want to wear those boots because they stand out and look really exciting when worn.

This is definitely an exciting costume project!