Anyway, TARDIS dress is complete! Well, mostly. I might add a little something later on. But that's not important. If you can use tape and wield a paint brush, you too can make a TARDIS dress (or TARDIS anything else. I think more guys should dress up as the TARDIS. I've seen a couple really awesome male TARDIS cosplays). It's a bit involved, but not hard, not in the least.
First things first: always, always wash clothes before modding them. New clothes are treated with stain resistors that will also resist glues, paints, and dyes. I've actually used this to make some cool tie-dye patterns in the past, but that's not helping us here. Follow the directions on the tag, or when in doubt- wash on a gentle cycle with mild detergent.
Lay your clean and dry dress out on a flat surface. Put cardboard inside to prevent the paint bleeding through, then center the dress as best you can. Make sure all the seams are matched up. It'll prevent things from getting wibbley-wobbley.
Then, divide just the skirt into equal squares. The size of your squares is going to depend on the dress, and your own personal preference. I measured things out, tried the dress on, measured things while wearing the dress, took off the dress and measured some more. There's no such thing as too much measuring. Anyway, my final estimate was to have the squares be 8 inches, with an inch and half between them. Again, you might need to use different measurements. Measure, measure, measure.
Then tape inside the squares, leaving a half inch strip. That's the strip we're going to paint, so make sure to keep things even.
When all four squares are taped off, tape diagonally from corner to corner. I originally saw this tip here, and I loved it so much I had to try it myself. This is going to help give us panels with a more 3-D look.
Now, in the tutorial I linked above, she used a light blue paint for the bottom corners, but the light blue paint that I bought wasn't light enough and ended up blending into the fabric. But I had just so happened to pick up some blue glitter (extra fine, from Michaels. The color was Sapphire), thinking I could totally find someplace on the dress to use it. I certainly did.
Paint the panel with fabric or tacky glue like you did the paint. Cover completely with glitter. Allow to dry, then shake off the excess. Then seal in the glitter with glossy mod podge (any other will dull the glitter. I don't know about you, but I want my glitter to really shine. I learned this tip here). Let that dry until it's clear, and remove the painter's tape.
The pull to open printable I used is here, and the St. John's Ambulance logo can be found here.
And that's all there is to it. Remember, I already made the top hat, so I don't have to add the "Police Public Call Box" sign.
But did you know that there's actually a TARDIS dress commercially available for Halloween this year? And it's actually kind of awful. It's weird looking, and doesn't come with anything except the dress. Total gyp, in my opinion. Especially when it's so easy to make your own.
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