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The Elizabethan Costumer's Guide To Home Depot I know there's a lot of you costumers out there who have touted cheap and effective alternatives to traditional costuming supplies, who don't believe that "cheap alternative" means "crappy substitute". Many of you reading this may already be familiar with some of these tricks, or you might have your own dirty little secret about where you get your costuming supplies (and please do tell me). My personal favorite place to get costuming goods is Home Depot. It's affordable, there's a store in every city on the planet, and each one of them carries the exact same thing which makes things really easy should you suddenly need to avert a major crisis (corset busk snapped, hoopskirt bit the dust, eyelet popped out, etc) 30 minutes before court and you have less than $10 in your pocket. Shown on this page are pictures of things that I have made that use supplies I garnered from Home Depot. Please note, I am not in any way associated with Home Depot... I am merely one very happy costuming customer (say that 5 times fast!). Also note, I do not take credit for any of these ideas... Even if I happened to think of it all by little 'ol self. Please feel free to claim these ideas for you own (last I checked, I'm not infringing on any copyrights, although I'll be happy to give credit where credit is due). Boning Substitutes: My two most effective substitutions do date are for boning and hoops. Acting on a tip from my pal Melissa, I tried plastic cable ties instead of metal boning. Now, don't let the word plastic scare you... This isn't the flimsy plastic boning you find at the fabric store. These are heavy duty cable ties, the sort used for quick & dirty handcuffs and securing large bundles of wood/cable/whatever. They come in several lengths, but I opt for the 24" and 36" ties. In testing their resiliency, I would have to say that they have basically the same strength when used in corsets as 1/4" metal boning for far less money. A package of 24" cable ties (10 ties per pack) will set you back about $5.00 US. One-and-a-half packs is usually all it takes for me to bone a single corset. I use the cable ties whenever I need to place boning in a garment, such as at lacing edges, front stiffening, etc.
A package of cable ties, approxamently 3/8" wide and 24" long. They can be cut with a regular pair of scissors to any desired length.
Fully boned effigy corset, boned entirely with cable ties. I like to call them "plastic whalebone". It's plenty of support, believe me. Recently, I've begun working with substitutes for hoop steel. Typically, I'd have to trek down to Lacis in Berkeley (a good hour and a half drive from my house) in order to restock on this hard to find item. Hoop steel is not cheap, costing about $35 for one 17 foot roll. Factor in gas prices and laziness and you've got yerself a problem. On another tip, this time gleaned from Tammie Dupuis' excellent site Vertetsable.com, I abandoned the hoop streel and tried inexpensive polyeurithene tubing. The tubing cost me under $3.00 US for a 25 foot roll and I bought 5 brass connectors for about $1.50 each. You can also buy the tubing by the foot, which ensures that it will not be too tightly coiled (I wound up having to stretch my lengths of hoop by placing one end under a foot of my baby grand piano and the other end under my couch, leaving it overnight to stretch out so I could use it).
A sample of polyeurithene tubing used in my farthingale. It is 3/8" diameter and comes on a 25 foot roll. It can be easily cut with scissors and lengths can be connected with brass "nipples" (I didn't make the name up, I swear!)
Your's Truly in the aforementioned farthingale. My metal boned farthingale would collapse before this one would. It's easily compressable, as well, for ease of movement. About four years ago, I discovered Home Depot was litterally throwing away metal strapping that was perfect for corset boning. It was garbage to them, so I was able to walk off with several feet of metal lumber strapping for free. The strapping was about 1/2 inch wide and typically was coated with something to prevent it from rusting (I have no idea what). All that I had to do was cut the strapping down to the size I wanted and file the ends blunt. It was virtually identical to metal corset boning, except it was totally free!
My blackwork corset. Fully noned with metal lumber strapping. It's downfall is that it rusts when it is washed, as I have found out. I don't use the stuff anymore, favoring plastic cable ties these days. The following picture of my first attempt at an effigy corset is somewhat of a cheat. I didn't get the boning from Home Depot, but rather from Michael's Crafts. I used bundles of decorative reed from the floral department to bone the corset. The leather piping around the edges is actually a chamois from Target, which cost me about $5.00 US and is totally waterproof. The reed, however, isn't, which is one of the big reasons why I remade this corset using the cable ties. By the way, the linen used in this corset came from the Purple Heart Thrift store down the street. It's previous life was as a table cloth. The whole thing cost me about $15 to make.
Other Ideas: Paint Stir Stick = corset busk Small metal washers = sewn over as eyelets Metal sheeting = cut down for corset boning or busks Small drip hosing = another substitution for hoop steel ©2002 - 2006 Sarah Lorraine Goodman |
