Leta Lestrange Cosplay

Hello all you lovely people,
I am here with a new blog post about my first ever cosplay! Yay!!

For years I have been interested in cosplaying. It seems like loads of fun and I've always wanted to try it, but I've been hesitant... For many reasons. One, being that I can't sew. Well... I suppose that's not true anymore, because I did sew! I made a whole dress, from my own pattern and with a tricky fabric, and all the obstacles could still not stop me! I actually made my own dress! I can barely believe it myself.

 

The second reason why I've previously hesitated to cosplay was that I just never found the right character. I didn't know who to cosplay. As a woman of colour I have always wanted to cosplay a character of colour too. I wanted a character that was a woman of colour, because it is important to me that we are seen! As the massive Potterhead that I am, I've always wanted to cosplay a Harry Potter character, but there hasn't been many options (pre Black-Hermione), and the options I had I didn't quite like. Enter Fantastic Beasts! Suddenly there are many more POC in the Potterverse, and they are interesting characters!

Leta Lestrange interested me from the get-go. Her relationship with Newt is something I'm very curious about and her character seems to be a complex one (which always sparks my interest). When I saw the costume that Zoë Kravitz wears as Leta Lestrange in the second installment of the Fantastic Beasts series; The Crimes of Grindelwald, I knew I had found my character to cosplay!

With the seven photos of the costume that has been released so far I embarked on my journey of sewing myself Leta Lestrange's burgundy dress. It's a very fun design, there's a theme of triangles on this dress. The sleeves have triangular pieces and there's a cape that is attached in a triangle in the back. The dress is however softened by the circular patterns on the skirt and the elegant cape that drapes the back of the dress.

It took me a little more than a week and a half to finish the dress. I won't lie - parts of it was tricky, but it was so much fun, and I really think that sewing can become a pastime of mine. My sister and I defied the cold weather to take some photos at one of the oldest buildings in my town. It was built in the 1920's and currently holds a school. It really has a gorgeous architecture that fits nicely with the era of The Crimes of Grindelwald.

Do you cosplay? If yes, what made you start? And how do you choose which character to cosplay? I had endless fun putting this together, and I do believe I can call myself a cosplayer now. A Potterverse cosplayer, at that! As of today, it is three days left until I see The Crimes of Grindelwald (*excited*), I'm seeing it on the 13th of November and I can't wait! Are you seeing it? When, and how excited are you? And what are your hypotheses on the new characters?

So the dress is made by me, but the wig is from Amazon, and the wand is Leta Lestrange's wand from Noble Collection. The book I'm holding in some of the photos is actually a stationery set made by MinaLima, that I got at the WB Harry Potter studio tour. All the photos are taken by my lovely sister, and edited by her and me.

Much love,
Mona