Time to brag: Opera iO

You will recall that one of the sacrifices made after moving out of town was Thursday sewing with my sewing circle. Fortunately for me, a year ago precisely my niece Ana Lía decided to join me on those days, and I finally had someone to share sewing with again. We have had to suspend those get-togethers for the time being, what with my move further away from her and because she decided to go back to school this year…

In any case, early this year Ana Lía was asked to create all the costumes for an opera that will be playing in Ecuador next year. I guess I didn’t share photos of this process because it wasn’t related directly to quilting. But now that promotional materials are coming out, I just can’t help sharing here some of the work of this enormously talented niece!

Although Ana Lía designed all the costumes, most of them were sewn by a team of people assigned to help her. The costume for the main character, however, was a painstaking task she undertook personally. Although some of the individual parts that form the base were sewn by machine, the majority of the work was done by hand. I was a privileged spectator, as I watched her week after week as she worked on this garment.

She first shared her drawing of the concept behind this costume:

And I was able to follow the process, going from putting the base together…

…to adding textural elements.

What did she use to create that texture? Well, floor mops will do just fine, thank you! 🙂

And how about some itty, bitty yo-yos, measuring just under 1/4″? This girl is crazy!

It was all starting to all come together…

…and, at last, the final fitting.

The finished costume. Isn’t that headdress just awesome?

And a few of the other costumes:

Awesome. Bursting at the seams with pride. 🙂

And a short promotional video for the opera:

Opera iO – Promo 1 from Opera iO on Vimeo.