This is a tutorial and overview of how I made my Toybox Miku cosplay – including materials, techniques, and some notes from my experience making it! Please enjoy and happy crafting
The Shirt
The shirt was made using the Azara top pattern from Mood Fabrics as the base. The sleeves were repatterned into puff sleeves with added elastic bands in the biceps and wrists to provide shaping. It’s made of plain white cotton and is fully lined. The gold striping on the front is a gold rhinestone trim from Simplicity, and the buttons are thrifted.
The back has a small pocket stitched into the lining to hold magnets for aligning the bow, and there are hook and eye and snaps stitched to the outside layer for attaching the bow to the shirt.
The Collar
The collar is a self-drafted pattern that was made referencing an old theater costume book. I made several mockups from scrap fabric before finalizing a pattern. It is made from a thrifted remnant of damask fabric and a chunk of upcycled bedsheet that matched in color. The fabric was stabilized using some fusible interfacing. The edges are covered with lengths of gold lame ribbon that was carefully placed using basting spray and then stitched down.
| added a button hole and button to the front to make it easy to put on and take off.
The stars and accent shapes were embroidered on my Brother PE-770 embroidery machine, and these designs were created and digitized by me using InkScape and Ink/Stitch. This is my first time ever using the machine for embroidering pattern pieces and I faced a lot of challenges getting the pieces lined up properly in the hoop. I used some gold embroidery floss, beads, and star charms to create some accent charms on the pointed ends of the
collar.
The Skirt
I made a large circle with a diameter 2-inches larger than the hula hoops used as the frame for the skirt, then divided it into 8 even segments for the outer blue and yellow layer. For the under layers, I cut 2 full circles from a white cotton, with a circle inside where my waist will be, and marked lines every 10-12 degrees (roughly). I stitched 30x 3/8-inch boning channels running from the center to the edges of the 2 layers of cotton, put the boning into the channels, and stitched around the inner circle of the waist-band opening to secure it in place. I added a layer of quilt batting and another layer of cotton over top of the boning layers to make the top-side of the skirt smooth, then stitched the outer edge to keep it in place – this completed the inner layers of my skirt.
Then I cut a circle from my red fabric to use as the underside and sandwiched my first hula hoop between the cotton/boning structure layers and the red underside.
This first hula hoop is free floating within the skirt to allow it to move if it is bumped into something. This free-motion will help with mobility in the skirt and prevent the hula hoop from being damaged and unfurling or damaging anything | may run into. I hand sewed the edges of the base layers and the underskirt together and did a basting stitch around the waistband opening. Then I added my second hula hoop, giving myself a lip about 4″ tall around the outside of the skirt. I wrapped the ends of the boning around the hoop and secured them with an industrial adhesive. For the outer side trim, I made several strips of ruffles from tulle, chiffon, and cotton to add texture and dimension to the skirt. The main details are the smocked (using a technique called rutching) and beaded trim pieces around the side-walls of the skirt and the waistband base.
For the top, | made an alternating-color layer with my blue and yellow-dyed fabric. The waistband is made of cotton, and the skirt closes with some basic hook-and-eye fasteners, clear plastic snaps, and a zipper. I added some Edwardian style scallops to the waistband to make it closer to the canon design.
I learned how to make “tulip trim” from ribbon and added gold beads to the cups of each shape and attached this to the waistband along with a length of pearl and lace ribbon.
The Back Bow
The back bow was made using the same red fabric as the underside of the skirt and the neck ruff bow. I made the main bow components by drawing out the shapes onto paper first as a guide to see how big I wanted them and the general shapes, and then cutting out the shapes from the fabric. The center of the bow has a 3D printed housing for a servo, this was modeled by me in Fusion 360. It has magnets in the back plate to help align and attach it to the shirt.
Once I had the servo housing printed and ready for use, I cut a chunk of fabric to sew into a cube shape and added a button hole to the front square for the servo to poke out of and allow the key to attach. The back edges were then trimmed and finished to fit the housing and allow the magnets on the back to be exposed.
I then built a frame out of cardboard to help support and guide the bow loop and tail pieces around the center piece of the bow. I sewed the rest of the pieces of the bow and attached them using adhesives and hand-sewing. I added 2 strips of fabric on either side of the front of the bow to make it look like a tied knot and less cube-y. The key piece is 3D printed, it was modeled by me in Fusion 360. It’s been finished using sanding, modeling paste, and gold and copper acrylic paints with a clear acrylic sealant.
The servo is driven by an Arduino 5v Trinket and the electronics are powered by 2 18650 rechargeable Li-Po batteries.
Since this cosplay is being debuted in the winter in the north, I opted to create a special pocket that is lined with an anti-static fabric to help prevent any potential shortages or other issues from static electricity. This also helps keep the electronics self-contained and organized. The program was programmed by my using the Arduino IDE, and some of my friends helped be troubleshoot when I didn’t realize that this version of Arduino’s do not have a built in clock/timer function.
The bow is held onto the back of the shirt using clear snaps for the bow loops, and hook and eye fasteners plus magnets for the main servo
chasis
The Tights
The tights were made using this pattern from Petite Stitchery (which is the best dang tights/stockings/thigh high pattern I have ever used)
I made the white base as a solid piece and top stitched the gold accents along the top and the navy stripes on the one sock. Basting spray is (in my opinion) an absolute necessity for this part of the process to keep the pieces of fabric from shifting. I used a knit fabric, but a spandex or any stretchy material would work. The skin tone color at the top is from Blue Moon Fabrics – Matte Skin Tone/Neutrals collection
I added the rhinestones after everything was stitched into place. For the star on the knee, I printed a template for me to “trace” with rhinestones and then used clear packing tape to lift my design and adhered it to the sock while I was wearing it (Note: If you do this, wrap your leg under the tights with plastic wrap to prevent the adhesive from seeping through the fabric and sticking to your skin)
The Wig
The base wig is a 26″ wig from Map of Beauty on Amazon in “Light Azure Blue”. I started by crimping the entire wig and then seam ripping the wefts from the netting base.
I marked out where I wanted the buns to be, constructed the bases from PVC Pipe and strips of thermoplastic, then attached them to the wig base and added a layer of low-loft quilt batting all over. I marked the size and position of the pipes onto some foam balls and covered those with quilt batting to use as the bun bases later. I colored the quilt batting blue to match my wefts using acrylic paint diluted with fabric medium and water.
I used Aleene’s clear gel tacky glue (diluted with water) and Tombow Aqua to construct new wefts for the wig and attached them to the wig using hot glue and tacky glue. I layered the wefts to create a split part at the top and herringbone design at the back, being careful to not add too much bulk around the PVC pipes. The buns were made by hot gluing wefts, allowing them to cool completely, then using a steamer to carefully guide and place the wefts around the foam ball. The ends were secured in place with glue and the wefts were brushed over with clear glue to seal them in place. The bangs were styled using cosmetic layering of wefts and quilt batting for volume without too much added bulk and weight.
I made the hair bows out of the same red and yellow fabrics used in the rest of this project, I added pearl rhinestones to the red to act as the polka dots. Each bow was made in 4 pieces for precise placement and sizing. The pieces were stitched to a 3D printed ring with holes in it to make sure they were evenly spaced and symmetrical on both sides (this ring was modeled by me in Fusion 360 for this project), the ring was placed around and attached to the PVC pipe, then the buns were attached and secured in place using hot glue.
I added glitter paint to the wig as highlights and accents, and used dark blue eyeshadows and mica powder to shade the other areas of the wig to add depth.
