HOW IT WAS MADE: Aerith Gainsborough (2015/2016)

March 17, 2021

Photographer: T.B. Photography

Aerith Gainsborough is a cosplay and character near and dear to my heart. I first played Final Fantasy VII when I was 8 years old and was so traumatized by the end of disk one that I couldn't finish the game until I was 13. Aerith was also the first cosplay I ever competed in and was altered/sewn completely by hand because I didn't have a sewing machine until a few years later. Most importantly, this was the cosplay through which I met Silas, whom I traded a Yuna wig for an Aerith staff~

The base of the costume itself was this $60 set I found on Ebay. I bought it knowing that it would need a fair bit of work but with hand sewing I wanted to have a solid silhouette to start with. The first thing I did was add a darker pink trim to the dress, which was composed of an unlined, slightly transparent light pink cotton.

The next portion was the jacket, which was way too long in both sleeves and hem. I took both up a few inches, adding white stitching to accent the fabric and give it a more denim look. This involved basically taking the jacket apart then putting it back together again.

The belts around the sleeves had to be resized, and the wrist cuffs were made of a vinyl-ish silver fabric sewn in layers. Frankly, those cuffs were a mess, but it was what I could affort at the time. The necklace was literally two thin headbands that I tied together because, again, I couldn't really afford buying extra materials. I also had to wear a tank top and shorts (black, why did I choose black???) underneath it because of the transparency of the dress. The hair bow and hair tie were the accessories included in the original costume, and since my hair was long enough and dark enough at the time I styled that instead of buying a separate wig. There was a bit of red in that brown, but it was early enough in my dye journey that my hair wasn't obnoxiously obvious in how different it was in color.

This was the initial iteration of the cosplay, something I was proud of for the moment but also something that I knew I could do better with. I wore it to the 2016 Alaska Gaming Convention and ended up getting second place in their cosplay contest, which entirely blew my mind and kickstarted my love for competing~

The remastered version of this cosplay began with upgrading the accessories. The headbands were taken apart and replaced with a thick, leather-like twine. Instead of wrapping all the way around the neck in one long piece, I added a snap in the back to put it on like any standard necklace. The wrist cuffs were remade using foam and hotglue. Why use hotglue, you ask? Well, not only do I just enjoy the rougher look when it come to armor, but it just made sense that Aerith wouldn't have access to the most finely crafted metal pieces.

For the jacket, I replaced the rounded silver buttons with flat black buttons that I'd painted gold. I also went in and added MUCH more of that white accent stitching to give it an even more denim look.

I replaced the clear buttons on the dress with white buttons and altered a pair of Ugg boots with detailing using the same twine I'd made the necklace out of. I made faux straps out of some extra brown fabric I had laying around and added them to the boots as well.

I never grabbed photos of the wig, but I did end up actually styling one for the updated version. My roots were grown out enough that I was able to blend the hard edge into my hairline to create something that looked fairly natural, if I do say so myself~

I wore the updated cosplay to Taikai Con 2015 and ended up getting 1st in the contest, which was so freaking amazing, all things considered~ It was also super fun to get newer photos and compare them to the first version!