First name and last initial:  Mary L.

Where are you from originally or reside currently?  Virginia

How long you have been cosplaying?  6 Years

Other Characters cosplayed: Disney’s Mulan, Undertale’s Temmie, Sailor Jupiter in many outfits, many Pokemon cosplays, with the latest being from ORAS May (the female protagonist), Avatar’s Korra & Katara, Ace Attorney’s Phoenix Wright & Maya Fey, Attack on Titan’s Mikasa, Eren, Sasha, and more!

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1. Who or what inspired you to cosplay?
You all have! I have gone to so many cons before, and I have seen so many lovely cosplays throughout the years. I learned sewing techniques, drafting, draping in classes, and decided to try it out for myself. I have always love to make things in general, so it was one targeted way for me to make more things!

2. What do you do when you aren’t cosplaying (hobbies, community service, or work)
I’m super busy getting a Ph.D, doing research to encourage people like cosplayers to build, sew and make stuff. I hope to make it a decade-long work to help you all out. That and cosplay take up the majority of my time, with my PhD work taking up the most time!

 

3. What costumes have provided the biggest challenge and rewards so far and why?
The Attack on Titan is one that was more props heavy, and was so much fun to make. I made so many tests on that cosplay, both on straps, the swords, paints, glues, so it was so much fun. The boxes went through many prototypes and mechanisms to be sure they stayed steady on the legs. The strap mechanism also went thriough a few cycles too. I made 2 entire sets of the props too for the lead female and male protagonist (Mikasa Ackerman and Eren Yeager), and it won 1st place at Star City Anime’s costume craftsmanship contest.
Oddly enough, the one with the biggest reward was my Temmie costume, and it was super quick to make. The photo is one variant of it when I got severely injured on my foot, and that stopped my whole life. The moment I got the okay to just stand was the moment I worked on this costume, which was days before a PAX East. I knew I had to go in wheelchair, so I wanted a costume that took advantage of the wheelchair. This costume was great because in-game, she’s just a shopkeeper sitting with a box. It was inexpensive and my first cosplay in a wheelchair and the first done post-surgery. Here’s more info on that.

4. What is the best advice you would give someone new to cosplaying?
“Fail fast and fail often.”  Failures are usually seen as negative, but failures are the ones that you learn the most, and gain the most experience points. To be good at anything at all, you need to try a lot of stuff. The more you try, the more you may fail and the more you learn. Beginners may see the gorgeous finished product of costumes, but not the countless fails that needed to happen to see the finished product.
See the failures as something positive. Make prototypes/mock-ups of clothing/props/etc, knowing they’re not the final product, and that you can play and mess with it. Maybe you’ll discover a cool way to make or do something!

5. What is one thing the cosplaying community can do better when it comes to dealing with each other?
I have written about this topic and how we can be better to each other. I’ll pick just the first one to talk about here, which is to engage with other cosplayers. Here’s a scenario that happens often: I recognized a costume at a con, and I greeted and complimented their costume. The cosplayer proceeded to chat about their own con lineup for about 5 minutes, including showing pictures of themselves, on their own lineup.
The chat was solely centered about them, and I couldn’t engage in a conversation with them, shy of a standard “okay”, “hmm”, “cool”. I was never asked anything at all, and I was also a cosplayer with a costume on.
We love our own work so much online and in person, promoting our own work, but sometimes, we may not engage with other cosplayers. So, the next time you chat with a cosplayer you haven’t met before, ask them questions. Maybe you’ll learn something new!