Body Suit

Vader wears a leather body suit (kinky lad).

I'm going to make mine a two piece suit as it'll be much easier to make and much quicker to attend any bathroom emergancies.  It could get ugly otherwise.  Just remember my three rules of bodysuit building:  ACCESS, ACCESS, ACCESS.

The Pants

I found mself a cheap pair of track pants that were a snug fit, ripped them apart and cut out some leather the same shape, but a bit larger for each piece. I only make them bigger because you can always take them in, it's harder to take them out. 

Make sure that you mark each piece so that you can fit it back together.  I had four pieces to my pants so I marked them Front Left, Rear Right, etc.

Now you might notice that I've only made the leather go down as far as the middle of the lower leg.  The rest will be stuffed into the boot.

Pin the pulled apart track pants to the faux leather and starting at the straight edge of the material, draw lines down the material 1 inch apart. 

Then I hit the sewing machine.  It's important to keep your lines staight so here's a few tips.

	Don't go slow.  Sounds weird but my lines were straighter the quicker I went.  Even short quick bursts are better than slow ones.
	Hold the leather and the track pant piece firmly and feed it through the machine.
	Make sure there is enough thread on the bobbin.  If you run out of bobbin thread in the middle of a run you won't know until you've finished and you've got heaps of holes in the leather.

This is after I've done the stitching.

The effect is probably not as 'padded' as I'd liked, however one must remember, the more padding the hotter it's going to be.  As I HATE the heat (and I've obviously choosen the wrong costume) I've put no padding between the track pant and the leather.

Anyway, the lines are straight and that should be the main concern.

Once you have prepared all your pieces, you're ready to sew them together.

Sew the Rear Left and the Front Left together down the side of the leg.   Now do the same for the Rear Right and the Front Right.

Now we need to sew the inside of the leg.  This is were it get's tricky and I'll try and explain it as best I can.

Fold the two pieces in half and sew the inside of the legs.  Start at the base of one leg and follow it around to the base of the other leg.

Now comes the tricky bit.

Sew the 'butt crack' (yes, that's the technical term) and then the front section.  If you want, you can very easily add a zipper to the front section for that 'easy access', however it's more of a luxury than a necessity. 

Now give them a test fit and make sure they feel OK.  If they are way too loose, then take them in a bit.

DON'T MAKE ANY FINE ADJUSTMENTS YET.  WAIT UNTIL YOU'VE FINISHED EVERYTHING.

As the Faux Leather can be expensive, and realistically you can only see some of the front, I'll only be doing the parts that will show.

My pants aren't really pants.  They are more like board shorts.  Hey, I'm sure Vader would've tied a ski rope to the back of The Executor and had a surf every now and then.

I think they have worked out OK.  I thought they would be difficult to do but they are very easy.  The only difficult part was sewing the pieces back together.

To add a bit more security, add a tie to the waistband.  I couldn't be bothered sewing in the elastic again so I just put the little ropey bit back in.

The Top

The top was just as easy as the pants.  I think the best option is to get a top that has a big collar on it (ie, a skivvy or something similar).  Unpick the sides and the arms only.  Leave the shoulder area stitched together as there is no need to cover the entire top with leather.  Just do the parts that will show which is the front and the arms.

Fitting them together.

OK.  Now that you've done the top and bottom of the body suit, you'll need to add some velcro to stop the suit from moving around too much and to stop your pants from falling down.

	Get some velcro that has the sticky sides.   Put the pants on and get them comfortable.  Now get someone to stick the velcro on about six areas around the waist.  One on each hip, two at the front and two on the back.  Place them at around where the codpiece will go.
	Peel off the other sticky side and pull the top over them, adjusting the top as necessary to get a comfortable fit.
	Peel the velcro apart making sure you don't peel the velcro off the pants of the top.
	Sit down at the sewing machine and stitch the velcro on.

 

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Updated: 28 April 2002