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I ordered this fabric the week of the event. It arrived the day before... on a wing and a prayer. I already had a soft vision of the look I was interested in achieving, but nothing precise on how to play it out.
The fabric and inspo were already pushing me in a direction opposite of my norm. I'm generally an edgier, un-patterned (and definitely not floral) lover of shapes and asymmetry. Texture is also my love, which was surely a major link to this fabric choice despite the other characteristics. Printed sequins on velvet? Yes, please. Layer on that sensory stimulation!
My inspo always included the corset layer + I'm going through a sleeve phase, but that was all I had. Silhouette? Neckline? *shrug* A lot of what I create for myself is intentional: I use myself as a literal model of possibilities. Custom design holds so much potential and I want folks to see examples of this instead of the same ol' trends fed to them by algorithms. And sometimes that forces me outside of my own box.
With a little over 24 hours, I sent an emergency birdcall to my friend Jas, who is highkey my go-to person to bounce ideas off of. (She named this look.) Somewhere through the night the idea for a slit came and went, sleeves were created on a whim, and I had to figure out how to add boning to a stretch lining successfully for the sake of boob security.
The results were something that reminded me why comfort zones exist (some fashion truly requires sacrifice... because my range of motion was limited, to say the least lol), but also why they're exciting things to challenge. This ending never would've been as stellar if I'd stuck to my norm.
Even my sister, who always does my makeup for these events, was pleasantly surprised by the style I was wearing and excited that she could finally use color on my face. Lol. Find her over at Modernly Beautiful Makeup!