Starting with a new cosplay in Tokyo!

Hey there!

It's been already a month since I moved and started living and studying in Tokyo and I enjoy it a lot!
I can only recommend to visit Tokyo if you have never been here. It's my second time and it's still wonderful!

Tokyo has a worldwide very famous convention: the Comiket!
Many people are attending it and this year I want to go too!

And of course I would like to wear a costume and after thinking a lot what it's going to be I decided to cosplay as Anna Williams from Tekken 7!

I didn't want to cosplay a character with armor since I don't have much space in the flat to properly work there (and I also don't want to leave any stains from spraying...)

Shortly before coming to Tokyo Anna was announced as DLC character for Tekken 7 and I really really had the urge to sew this outfit! Now it's the chance!

I rarely post any progress pictures of my costumes but I would like to change it with this one. I want to make very detailed posts with my way of planning and realising the costumes and I hope you look forward to it!

Fabric-shopping in Nippori

Last week I went to Nippori to buy the fabric for the costume. I heard and read online in my forums that Nippori is very famous for buying fabrics! And after being there I can only say that it's true! But first I checked with Photoshop the color ranges from Anna's outfit. I mostly do it for cosplays I sew for competitions but here I wanted to do this as well since I really need the purple-blue-grey part of her skirt to match with the red. Once I'm done it always looks like this.

With this picture on my phone I went to Nippori to find the perfect fabric!
Of course I had to keep in mind two things:
1. I haven't started with the pattern yet, but since I have some experience with those kind of skirts I knew beforehand how much I might need. But in the end it's always better to do the pattern first.
2. The fabric for the body part had to be black and semi-transparent. On my skin it should be looking brownish. And since it's a dress I wanted the other fabrics to be shimmering!

Once in Nippori I was amazed by how many different fabric shops they had there! In my hometown we have one big department store where you can buy fabric too and else...only some little stores or local fabric markets where you hope to find the fabric you need. The other opportunity would be to order your fabric online, but that takes a lot of time since you would want to order samples first. And then you hope that one of the samples fits the fabric you need.

In Nippori I found the fabric I would like to have on the same day. Of course I looked into many stores but still it was pretty new to me that I had everything on day one since I'm very picky.

It's hard to capture the colors but here you can see them!
Fun fact: Before I went to look for the fabric I said that the fabric for the body should have the following attributes:
It should be dark, semi-transparent, stretchy AND IT SHOULD GLITTER.

I really wanted it to glitter. I never actually thought that I would find such a fabric, this was only my dream fabric.
And then I found it. I was so happy!

Now that I found the fabric als that is left is sewing. But before I can do that I need to buy a sewing machine and do the pattern.
The pattern will be done next!

I'm sorry for that big post but there was really a lot to write down and show here.
I hope you are interested in reading about my experience in doing a cosplay in Tokyo and I would be happy if you would share your thoughts with me!

EXTRA: Buying a wig

Since I had some time (and money) left I went to AssistWig in Ikebukuro. I was really amazed by the variety and colors of wigs they had there!
And the price was totally okay too! In Germany I used to usually buy my wigs online and it was always a gamble if the color matched or not.

Here I had the opportunity to look at the colors in person and choose the right one matching my costume!

It was a great experience and the staff was very nice.
AssistWig offers also some other cosplay related products which I would like to test! I can only recommend their wigs!
(A longer review with pictures and a tutorial how I am going to style it will come at a later point though.)