gain, this is a two-piece dress consisting of jumper and underdress, similar in construction to the Requiem and BR dresses. Together with those two, it makes the "Trio dresses" (just in case you hear this term and don't know what it means). This dress has long been described as her "wedding dress" since it appeared on a promotional stand-up that was in stores even *before* FotR came out. I don't know if the standee was exclusive to Germany, but I've walked past it several times in my video store. It shows Arwen in the Coronation Dress on the right side, between Aragorn and the hobbits:

Because of the crown and the formal pose, this was labelled as wedding dress. It got changed to Coronation Dress to match the official descriptions. Still, we don't know if it's *also* her wedding dress, or if there's a separate wedding dress for each of the two ladies (because Éowyn's Coronation dress raises the same question). Strictly speaking, Aragorn and Arwen do not wed at the coronation. In the book, the two events are separate from each other, with the wedding being a few weeks ahead of the coronation. So, there might be a chance that one day, Arwen's real wedding dress will appear. In the meantime, this is a nice place for an original design...

The dress has been on display at the FIDM (Fashion Institute for Design and Merchandising) exhibit in 2004, and again at ComicCon also in 2004. Many good pics from the two exhibitions are over at Alleycatscratch. Also, I recommend Kathy's study page.
There's an Arwen action figure in the "Coronation Giftpack" from Toybiz that is dressed in what seems to be the Coronation Gown (it has not much resemblance to the original), and the Arwen Coronation Barbie from Mattel is also wearing a simplified version of this gown.

The fabrics of the gown are clear, thanks to Ngila's extensive description :-)
There's still, however, discussion about the colors. It has always been described as being 'lime', but in pictures it appears to be so many different colors from the near kiwi green to the right to that washed-out greyish green on the BTS picture with PJ. For a while, I believed that this posed picture from "Art of Return of the King" shows the actual color, because these pre-production shots are taken under the best lighting conditions and in front of a neutral white background. Their purpose is to get a general impression of how the costume color will "behave" under certain circumstances (esp. light). These shots help the camera and light teams to put the costume in relation to the set, surroundings and also other actors - and to find the best lighting. However, on the current FIDM display, the dress does look *much* lighter colored, very hard to describe, a mixture between 'lime' (as in lime tree = linden ) and spring green. This means either that in the film & other shots, they used a color filter *or* there are more versions of this dress. This would also explain the early appearance on the standee, and some differences between this early dress and the final version we see in the films. Until now it has been suggested that the standee dress has been made early for promotional reasons, and the dress wasn't completely finished then. They were still on a budget back then, but when they realized how big the project was going to get, more work went into the dress. However, it's also possible that we have to deal with two separate versions, one made at an early stage and never shown in the films, the other one being the final movie gown - which would explain the significant color changes. However, in the SEE commentary of RotK, Ngila says explicitly that no dress of the female characters has been made twice, unlike for example the hobbit outfits or everything that had to be made in scale, or in several stages of decay. Because Arwen's dresses are "couture dresses" it would have been too expensive to make more than one. Still,I'm not too sure we can trust this...

The dress is two-part, has a long train and almost floor lenght sleeves. The sleeves have an underlayer of yellow silk mousseline that is crinkled and interwoven with silver thread. Silver trim on the overdress, silver beading on the underdress, and extremely fancy fabric for the upper sleeves. There's a zipper in the back of *both* dresses, recent photos from the Comic Con display have proved that.

Green silk velvet shoes match the dress. The butterfly crown will get a separate page soon.

Picture scanned from "Art of the Return of the King" by Gary Russell

Images from the RotK SEE (more are in the media section)
- General shape of the dress

(unfortunately the lighting is not very good on these pics)

 

A new scan of the gown, from a German collector's magazine. The image itself is rather old, it first appeared on a jigsaw box and a bookmark, but there was no full shot until now. I think the color is most accurate on this picture, and you can also see the way the two trims and the sleeve layers behave. Also, the outer layer of the sleeves is not lined. It's just the silk velvet hanging down.

I have this pic again, from a calendar, and it shows two interesting dress designs for Gondorian Noble women on the left side of Arwen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DESCRIPTION

1. Underdress - trim & upper sleeves

Sleeve design

Totally forgot I had this....
Before we talk about trims, we need to see what the upper sleeves look like!
This is a glass cleaning cloth that was given out for promotion at the premieres of Two Towers. It is printed with the pattern of Arwen's Coronation Sleeve! There are several of these cloths, some of them with patterns of Éowyn's Dresses, some not quite clear...
However this one seems quite close. The little pearls are white though, not green (had this confirmed by people who saw the dress in the exhibit). What are the green threads that run among the patterns? Are they sewn on? Embroidered? Quilted? This will be extremely hard to recreate.....
The fabric appears to be brocade (not the cloth of course but the real fabric).

Trim on neck and sleeve joint

On the pre-FotR standee, it looked as if the trim on the neck and arms of the underdress was simply a wide band made of the sleeve fabric (the beaded stuff) and edged with pearls or beads. The pics were too fuzzy to tell 100%. The recent high-res pics provide a better view though:

(Click on the pics for heeeee-ouge res)

What I think is going on here....

...and what has been confirmed from several people over at ACS in the meantime:

There is no "trim" on the underdress at all!

This is a fake trim! The beadwork of the upper sleeve extends down to the joint of upper and lower (velvet) sleeve. The transition is masked by a silver multiple strand chainstitch (could also be a tiny silver braid, but it looks like chainstitch to me) and a row of clear/iridescent bugle beads. The ornaments of the upper sleeve continue into this "trim",but there are more pearls and bugles sewn into it so that it creates the idea of a real, heavily beaded trim. The same goes for the "trim" on the neck. The fake band hits her at shoulder level and separates the upper sleeves from the neck. It creates the idea of wide trim, but it isn't! Duh! :-)

Remaining questions:

* Where the heck is the shoulder seam??? Is it hidden under the beads?
* How is the sleeve set into the armhole? They didn't cut it in one piece...did they?

Yet another mystery - the "disappearing fabric"

We know from the still below that not the whole underdress is made of this beaded brocade. At least the back, and probably the not-visible front of the top are of different, pale green fabric. Since the EE came out, this can be confirmed with several other stills:

White: embroidered brocade (like sleeves)
Black: plain, pale-green or white fabric

It's probably satin, which would make sense. It was speculated that probably the brocade was too expensive to have the whole top made of it; but honestly.... would they really do that in a movie where even the fabric for 

"...this incredible dress that you don't even see, because they're in this tight on my face" [The elusive Cranberry Velvet Dress] costs "[...] like a gazillion dollars" ?
( Liv Tyler).

Nope! Don't think so. The real reason might be that fabric with that heavy an embroidery -like the sleeve brocade - would be extremely hard to wear, especially when you want to get out of the dress. The velvet overdress would get caught in the beads (I've done this with other costumes. It's a pain in the a*** to get out again without ripping anything off!). Also, the pearls and beads would most likely form little lumps that can bee seen through the overdress, which wouldn't look nice. There's also the danger of damaging the fabric when the overdress constantly rubs against the beading.
So, my guess is satin for the not-visible parts so she can put it on and off smoothly. Just a mere guess though.
Another theory is that this dress was made in an early stage of production (henceforth its appearance on the Trilogy/Pre-FotR standee!) and they were still experimenting...trying to save money.

The skirt part of the underdress is probably made of silk satin, too. Again, reason would be that satin doesn't "stick" to the velvet and provides a good "flow". Since the Cornation dress is similar in construction to the Requiem and BR dress, it appears likely. At least the Requiem dress has a confirmed silk satin underdress/skirt part.

2. Overdress (Jumper)

Not much to say, basic description is given by Ngila herself.

It has an extensive train, probably about 1/2 meter. It also pools in the front, that means it hasn't been made for walking much, but for ceremonial standing. The common opinion is that it's relatively loose fit, but I personally think it's a rather tight fit at least in the bust area (see reference img. #3 above). However, since I have not seen it in person () I can't really make a statement about that. It has the typical look that both the Requiem and BR dress jumpers have; as if the velvet hangs from the strap of trim only.

The trim

On all the pre-FIDM pics it looks as if the trim is a small silver band, probably one of those Sari trims that were used so often on other dresses. Ngila even says:
"The neckline and sleeve decoration is heavily beaded silk, overdyed, and then overbeaded again, to give richer design detail--all in silver".
But the new pictures of the dress at FIDM and Comic Con confirme that the neck trim on the outer dress is a small band of gree/white paisley fabric with silver highlights that is edged by silver chainstitsch and tiny silver or clear bugle beads. The pattern of the paisley fabric hasn't been worked out yet.

3. Anything else

I noticed the shoes were a matching color, which is interesting. I have e-mailed Jim from Ringstyle who was kind enough to send me a picture of the original shoes:

Can you believe Arwen wore house slippers for her coronation? ;-)

And the official image from the DVD gallery confirms this
(unfortunately the lighting is not very good on these pics)

I'd like to have a pair made by Jim, but unfortunately these are expensive in my size, so until I can afford them, I'll try & make my own. Also because the shade of the original ones wouldn't match the color of my dress. So I bought two pairs of white Chinese Mary Janes, one in cotton and one in velvet, and dyed them green. The cotton ones didn't take the color at all, they're very very light green if anything. The velvet ones first were yellow as tennis balls, but while drying, they turned a lovely green. I now have to add beads and sequins in the style of the original.

Version 1.0

(or: can you believe how many darn shades of *green* there are? )

Most recent update: I have decided to make a new Coronation Gown. Not necessarily this year or until a certain point of time, I just want to make one. I'm so not happy with the color of mine. It photographs *yellow* instead of green!!! I really do like the color on me and everything, but I think I want one more close to the original. If I only could dye it again, or remove the dye, but because of all the beading, this is a no-no. Everything else on this gown, I'm happy with...just the darn color! The embroidery is okay (and I've worked on this for HOURS!), the fabric is okay, the printed sleeves are okay, the shape is okay....just the color is not okay. And that's a problem.

So, I will finish mine and either sell it, or keep it as a non-Arwen dress. I think I'll rather keep it. The I'll order another million of pearls and bugles and start all over again...hee hee hee. Well, at least I will be able to learn from the mistakes I made in the first dress. The Coronation Gown was only the second dress I sewed after my Lúthien gown, so there are some mistakes naturally. No big ones, but some things that could've been avoided...

I think I haven't yet posted these (from RingCon 2004, thanks to Catha and Robert for taking them!):

Coronation Gown Version 1.0
started December 2002

The white silk velvet I'm using for the dress (pre-dye)

The satin for the underdress
(this was a cheap eBay find ... 3 m for $11, and I'm really pleased with it)

The dyed silk velvet.
The color used was a regular washing machine dye in "Pistachio". For 5 m, I needed about 40 ml of the liquid dye.

Jumper

Things still to do:
* Adjust neckline - it's not wide enough yet
* Adjust waist - still hanging a little too loose there.

Underdress

Printing the sleeves

Oh well...finding a proper fabric for the upper sleeves is out of options. First, I'm too lazy to look around; second, I'll probably never find something close enough save the real thing (which is, I guess, a bit too pricey for me. I also assume that it has been custom made, so maybe you can't get this special brocade at all?).
So, the choices were either all hand-embroidering or printing. I have done fabric printing before and it worked really well, so I chose to do a combination here: I printed the basic design on the fabric and I'm going to over-embroider it with little white pearls and crystal bugle beads.

The fabric for the upper sleeves is the same silk velvet than the overdress, 'cause I'm really not in the mood to track down, dye and print a suitable brocade. Ta!

Tutorial: Making a stamp (template) & printing on fabric


Results (fabric for upper sleeves)

This one was a practising piece...the pattern is a bit..eh...irregular. However, I think I'm going to actually use this piece because the stamp imprints are really clear, and you won't see the irregularities in the design once it's sewn into the armholes.

This piece here, I'm really satisfied with. The pattern is regular and straight. The color looks a bit spotted, this is because no two stamp prints are exactly the same. It makes your fabric really unique. Once it's embroidered, the little color differences won't be noticed...

 

Lower sleeves - Underlayer - Silk mousseline

Thanks to a helpful soul over at the ACS mailing list, I managed to find a retailer for silk mousseline, the original fabric used for the second layer of the sleeves (well, not the original *retailer*, but - hey! ;-) ). It's Hanson Silks UK . I purchased a sample first with which I was very pleased (they charge £3,50 for as many samples as you like, so I ordered some more, mostly printed silk chiffons that my friend considered suitable for her Éowyn Green Gown-underlayer. The quality of the fabrics is excellent, I can only recommend them!). Anyhoo, I then ordered 4 m of the mousseline which was - at £ 7.99 /m ($15 app.) - very reasonable in price, I think. I received it within 3 days after placing my order; very fast and convenient shipping.

This silk mousseline is the softest fabric I have ever seen! It's amazing! I couldn't even capture it on film properly because it's sheer as a spider's web. It really looks as if made by elves! Here's a funny picture I took, the only one on which you can clearly see it, and it's a pity you can't really feel the quality!

UPDATE 3/3/04

Just dyed the silk mousseline. The color used was Avantgarde "Lemon", a German brand, one I love to work with. At first I was shocked at how *yellow* it was when it came out, although I used about 5 liters of water to mix the color with. But of course, when it was dry, the color was very soft & pale. I just held it next to the green velvet, and it looks excellent! The fabric also hasn't lost any of its softness and drape.

I'm afraid it's still a tad brighter than "pale lemon", but it matches the spring green of the dress, and...well, I'm not a dye house, and I don't have the money to buy some extra metres of fabric just for color experiments - New Line has, I don't So it's just normal I can't achieve *exactly* the same results....

The mousseline is just finished with a zig zag as in the original dress; not because I want it close to the original but because I think if I hem it, it wouldn't drape as nicely as it does.

The sleeve dilemma

Just when I wanted o start on the outer velvet sleeves, I noticed I had actually no idea what they looked like. I always assumed they looked like in this drawing, which would make them half circle sleeves:

When I looked at some pictures again, particularly the "Art of"-one and the sleeve close-up from FIDM, I more and more became convinced that they are elliptic circles with the "arm" side being shorter than the part of the sleeve that hangs down in the back - if you can still follow me :-)

Reasons for this:

1) Art of RotK-pic: There's not enough fabric draping from her forearm for the sleeve to be a full or half circle. If it was one, there'd be *much* more folds and the fabric, esp. the mousseline which is folded back over the velvet for about 20 cm or so, would be bulky.

2) FIDM close up of sleeve: The arm is almost outstretched here, the hand is still showing though; minimal folds in the fabric. Not possible if it were full/half circle.

3) Art of RotK - costume concept: At first, it looks as if the velvet sleeve was just folded back here like the Mousseline, but when you look closely you'll see that the sleeve shape is probably close to the second drawing above. The mousseline sleeves are slightly longer than the velvet ones.

Since I had so much fabric and didn't want to waste it, I decided to go with the half circle sleeve nevertheless, keeping in mind that I can always alter it to the accurate version. I just wanted to see if it would really look too bulky with that much fabric draping from your arms. So far, I'm not yet convinced to change the sleeves, though I might do it for practical reasons for the convention I want to wear the dress to.

So, first I attached the mousseline underlayer to the *inside* of the upper sleeve, afterwards I attached the silk sleeves with a medium size zig zag to the outside (the stitches will be hidden under the beading later). So far, I'm quite pleased with it. The beadwork is still missing, that's probably a work for some months, but here are some pics.
It looks a tad too yellow in most of the pics, that's the darn flash of the digi-cam... Color is most accurate on the last two pics...

The crown was kindly made by Didier from Atélier des Elfes which, sadly, is closed now.

UPDATE 07/06/2004

Some weeks ago I found a fabric on the sales table of a fabric store that is perfect for the trim of the overdress! It's a knit fabric that matches in color, and it also has a bit of a paisley design.

UPDATE 02/07/2004

Phew! Finally I got time to work on my dress again! I've now altered the neckline (widened it a bit) and cut & dyed the trim. It came out lovely, not too silvery but with a slight sheen. I've taken some pictures to illustrate how I made my trim from a normal piece of fabric.

Step 1: Cut two equally wide stripes from your fabric. Place them right on left. Note: I just did this because I used a knit fabric that has small holes, so I used another stripe for backing and giving it more texture (the second stripe will shine through). If you use a non-knit fabric, you can just use one stripe. Make a tiny hem on the lower edge.

Step 2: Turn over so that the stitches are on the inside, and press. This way, the right sides of the fabric will still be laying atop each other, but you'll get a nice edge. Leave the upper edge unfinished, this will be turned under the neckline of the dress.

I dyed my "trim" in a color bath, using hot water and the same contour color that I also used for the sleeve design. Now I'm going to fix it to the dress with chainstitch along the lower edge (the original dress has chainstitch there as well. Compare here. Thanks to Cat from Alleycatscratch for letting me use this pic!). Beading will be added in due course...

UPDATE 05/08/2004

Yikes! I've finished the embroidery on the overdress a week or so ago :-) I did a little comparison using the new pics from Comic Con. A thing I noted,the bugles on Arwen's dress are as crooked as on mine! Hee hee....
The small bugles are easier to sew on than the big ones though. Now the overdress is almost done (99,9%), I just need to sew a small satin band on the inside,where you can still see the silver thread; and stabilize the trim with interfacing.

I also changed the front panel on the underdress 'cause I didn't like the way it behaved on the shoulders. I'm not 100% satisfied with the new panel also,but I won't make any more changes. It's okay now in the shoulder section, and that's what I wanted after all. The next thing will be the embroidery on the underdress, which I already dread...

20/08/2004

I ripped off all the clear seed beads from the sleeves (the one that you can see above) and replaced them with smaller seed beads in silver (the ones I used for the neckline). I wasn't able to get these beads anywhere before, but now I've found a source. They're easier to work with and look *much* better.

*********

This section is closed. Version 1.0 of the dress will be finished because I have put so much effort into this dress that I dont want to leave it incomplete, but when the rest of the beading is done, I will start on the new version. Read above for reasons why.

 

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