Costumes of Middle Earth Project

The "Costumes of Middle Earth" project is something I've always wanted to do. It originated from the "Ladies of Middle Earth" project, but in the meantime it includes also men, so I came to call it "Costumes of Middle Earth" (CoME) instead.

There are so many characters throughout Tolkien's works, especially in my favourite The Silmarillion, who play a great role in the history of Middle Earth. Unfortunately, many of these characters are never clearly described or just vaguely characterized by a few words.

Especially on the elven side, there are lots of interesting characters. I've always imagined what these people would look like, and especially what they would *wear*. For expample, there's the 'White Lady' Aredhell or Idril Celebríndal who is said to be clad only in silver and white. Miriel's name is also "The broideress", for she was known for her excellent needlework - wouldn't that be an occasion for an intricately beaded gown? And what would the robe of Elbereth, the star-queen look like?

I imagined it'd be much fun to experiment a bit with Tolkien's descriptions and base my ideas and designs on them.

So far, I've only produced one dress, the Lúthien Gown, which sort of initiated the project. Of course it'll be a long way since there are so many other things to finish first, but every now and then when I feel compelled to design my own stuff, there's the possibility that another costume of Middle Earth comes into being... :-)

Here are some of the characters that are of interest to me
(Point mouse over thumbnail to see artist and copyright. Artists websites can be found at the bottom of the page)

LADIES

Aredhel Ar-Feiniel The white Lady of Gondolin	Celebrían Daughter of Galadriel and wife of Elrond	Idril Celebríndal The Silverfoot	Indis ... of the Vanyar	Lúthien Tinúviel The nightingale finished	Melian The Maia	Miriel Serindë The broideress	Varda Elentari The Star Queen	Yavanna The giver of fruits
LORDS
			more to come
Fëanor Mightiest of the Noldor in progress	Maedhros The Tall	Maglor The mighty singer

Artist's websites

These are the sites I took the images for the thumbnails from. Thumbs made by me, paintings belong to their respective owners. No copyright infringement intended.

Ivanneth

Catherine Karina Chmiel (Kasiopea)

MagicMyth on DeviantArt

Norma Peters on Elfwood

Other Sources:

I believe the image for Melian might come from this place: Finnish Tolkien Art website. I'm not sure though as I don't understand much Finnish, but this is about the only place where this picture appears.

All original work is protected by intellectual property laws. No copyright infringement is intended - copyrighted images are being used for costume study purposes only. © for images from 'The Lord of the Rings' movies is with New Line Cinema / the Saul Zaentz Company. Names of places, people and things from 'The Lord of the Rings' books are © The Tolkien Estate. Site design, graphics, and content is copyright © Ela unless otherwise indicated.