Thread: Embelishment ideas??

I've been looking for a skirt that has a lot of movement and found this one:

Tailor Drag queen LATIN BELLY dance Fringe long Skirt | eBay

I'm thinking I want it in red, with a black bedlah. I am NOT a sewer, so I was looking at fairly inexpensive bedlahs on ebay and found this one:



I'm not sure how "cheap" the bedlah will look, but it's the nicest looking one I've found.


When I put them together, this is what it looks like:



Anyone have Ideas for a headband, armband, or ways to make the bedlah more "professional" looking? If the bedlah looks cheap I was thinking of buying gems or beads to put on some areas. Anyone know the best place to purchase them?

Any suggestions would be helpful!

Thanks! =D

Setting aside the question of whether "inexpensive " translates to "cheap" when you see the costume in person...

I don't mind the black and red combination, but I don't think that skirt suits that style of belt. If nothing else, beaded swags often tangle with beaded tassels, and beaded fringe tends to tangle with chainette fringe, so that's a lot of potential for knotting up. I'm also concerned that this style of skirt is pretty busy on its own, and it might look better with a simpler belt. I'd suggest pairing this belt with a trumpet or circle skirt instead.

If you want to coordinate black and red, one possibility might be to switch out the black gems for red ones. To keep the cost down, you would probably be looking for acrylic gemstones, instead of the more expensive glass or crystal stones. They're not as nice, but they are cheaper, and it may not be worth the investment to splurge on high-end materials for an inexpensive costume. I can't tell from the picture if the stones are glued on or sewn. If they're sewn, it's easy to cut them off. Glued ones might be more difficult to remove, depending on the adhesive. As far as the stones themselves, if you can't find acrylic sew-on stones in the size/color you want, but you can find the non-sew-on ones, you can actually drill your own holes and convert them if you don't want to glue them. (I can't recommend this with the glass or crystal ones, though. I'm sure it's possible to drill into them, but it's probably cheaper to buy settings than experiment with a drill until you get the technique down.)