“As a sage, I can return you to your original time…”
Princess Zelda, Ocarina of Time
Cosplayer Lunar.Lyn may not possess the same time bending powers as the legendary princess but, for a moment, she can return many of us to that first time we reached the final moments of Ocarina of Time and rescued Princess Zelda from the clutches of the dark and evil Ganondorf. In 2017 and 2018, Lunar.Lyn made her thirteen year-old’s dreams a reality and became her childhood favourite character, Princess Zelda, and took us all on a journey to the past.
Adult Zelda from Ocarina of Time wears a gorgeous pink and purple dress accessorized with a tabard, armor, belt and a crown-like headpiece. Each and every component requires careful planning, patterning, and craft skills to bring to life; and perhaps a bigger feat than facing off a giant swine upon a crumbling castle. Lunar.Lyn didn’t back down from the challenge, con-crunching for seven weeks to complete her transformation from sleepless hermit to dazzling princess.
All good cosplays start with a mock-up — of which Lunar.Lyn made a few. Sacrificing sleep, she was determined to make a design she was happy with. There are no walkthroughs or guides online on how to recreate our favourite characters, especially with each of us having our own body types, heights and sizes that rarely match the characters on screen. By patterning, drafting and using spare fabric, Lunar.Lyn sewed and made mocked dresses until she found a finished look she was happy with. Only then did she begin to craft the real dress using carefully hunted and picked-out fabrics — chosen to match the colors seen in the official Ocarina of Time artwork of Adult Princess Zelda.
With the base of the dress complete, it was time to start adding all the details. From the many, many yards of bias tape for the skirt detailing, to the shimmering accessories acting as gold, and the blue tabard to pull the full look together. The headpiece, armor, and belt came together through foam work. This was Lunar.Lyn’s second ever foam build and it was a test of her newly acquired skills. In an act of sustainability, the foam pieces used were left over from previous projects in conjunction with contact cement and a felt lining. There are even straws from Starbucks hidden within the armor! With hours of dremeling and a coat of paint, no one could even tell. One doesn’t need a blacksmith and a ingot of gold to craft shiny pauldrons.
The blue tabard also tested new and old skills. The main blue fabric used was a silk dupioni, complimenting the matte silk dress, silk charmeuse tunic, and miliskin spandex gloves. The shapes were digitally patterned and printed in order to cut and craft silk. The pattern design came together with satin stitching, painting and appliques. The satin stitching didn’t come easy and a hint of doubt came through as Lunar.Lyn stitches weren’t as smooth as she hoped. Nevertheless, she let it go and kept working because, in the end, it still looked cool. We all tend to be our worst critic, and while it wasn’t perfect in Lunar.Lyn’s eyes, she accepted that the stitching still provided the look she needed to pull off the design.
Mockups, dress, tunic, belt, crown, tabard, gloves… and still, there are a couple more components to come together to truly turn Lunar.Lyn into the Princess of Hyrule. Princess Zelda bears gorgeous golden hair that can be recreated with the aid of an equally as golden wig, so she purchased a wig in a ginger blonde color. She used the wig as a base, adding wefts for more volume and to hide seam lines as well as adding ventilation. With a bit of styling, Lunar.Lyn possessed a lace front wig mirroring the look we see in game. Add a pair of silicone ears and Lunar.Lyn was finally ready to become a princess — just in time to show off at the next convention.
Lunar.Lyn brought her new Princess Zelda cosplay to the 2018 Anime Los Angeles Masquerade event, and competed in the cosplay competition. Her seven weeks of crunching, crafting and giving up sleep was all worth it as she left the competition with not one, but two awards. She won Best in Master Class Craftsmanship and Best Character Representation in Performance. The awards came as a surprise but it didn’t stop Lunar.Lyn from feeling thrilled and humbled to have all her hard work noticed.
After the convention and the competition, Lunar.Lyn graced her social media pages with professional photographs capturing the Princess in some iconic moments and magical atmosphere. From playing the Ocarina of Time, to being graced with the presence of a fairy, and being held in the darkness of a castle, Lunar.Lyn fulfilled her dream of becoming Princess Zelda.
