Alessa Gillespie - Silent Hill Origins



Cost: $15
Time to Make: 10 hours
Timeline of Construction: December 2007 - January 2008


Pictures




Information

Since I became interested in the Silent Hill series of games in late 2005, I missed the initial release of the first four games. When I heard Silent Hill Origins was coming out, I followed the news about its release from the start. I bought it the moment I could get my hands on it here in Toronto and I loved playing it. Although a lot of people worried about the game being made by Americans instead of the original Japanese group, I think Climax did a wonderful job at creating an involving and exciting back story for Silent Hill. Anyway, when I first played the game I really didn't pay much attention to the characters. I didn't really think I would find anyone to Cosplay but a few weeks before Ohayocon I was randomly looking at SHO pictures and I noticed that I sort of resemble Alessa. In this version they decided to give her brown hair and to have her wear it up in a ponytail (the way I typically wore my hair at the time). After finding a neat purple fabric at Fabricland, I knew I would have to try to make this costume for Ohayocon.

I ran into a lot of complications with making the costume. Although the design is really simple, it was actually pretty hard to find a decent pattern to work with. I eventually found one, but I ended up adding the waistband after the dress was made using velcro. It sort of bunched up in spots when I was wearing the dress. The dress shouldn't have been that complicated but I somehow managed to keep messing up on little things (like I accidentally managed to cut through the first zipper that I bought). The sleeves also kept bunching up when I sewed them in so I had to get my mother to help me fix it. I was sort of rushing to finish this costume before the con and I was even hemming the sleeves and the bottom of the dress during the car ride to Ohio.

I thankfully already had a nice white shirt with a wide collar that I could use. I also already had a red tie that had been a present from Sakura for my Sven costume. I randomly bought black mary jane shoes a couple of years ago at a second-hand store and they turned out to be perfect for Alessa. I wore my T-kingdom binder to flatten myself out a bit so I looked a little more like a kid and I used my own hair for once for this costume. It felt weird to not wear a wig. My hair actually gave me a bit of trouble. I had to get Pan to help me straighten it and style it (since at that time I had never straightened my hair) but it ended up working out pretty well.

Out of all the Silent Hill costumes I've made so far, I think Alessa suits me the best. I had fun wearing this costume. Maybe I can convince a friend to do Travis so I can terrorize him in photos. :3 At Ohayocon Kevin did a shoot of me in the stairway of the Drury. The stairway worked very well for Silent Hill photos although I got a lot of dust on my dress while doing the shoot.

Events/Conventions this costume was worn to
Ohayocon 2008 (Friday)

Photo Credits
Stillvisions


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