Fat tribal belly dancing?

[childunit]

Hi! So here's my question. I really want a tribal belly dancing costume, but I am 1) poor (why is this stuff so frakkin' expensive?!) and can't really sew, and 2) I have boobies and can't find a pre-made bra top that's larger than a 34 B, which is annoying

Comments

[knox_y]

The part about covering a bra is what I did to help a friend (who isn't a fatshionista as she's like 100lbs) who had to have a belly dancing costumes for her whole dance troupe. We asked all the girls to buy a black bra that was a convertable one and then her and I got to beading, sewing and gluing. We had 6 bras to do as well as belts and stuff. It was fun. We had some catch up time, drank some margaritas and made a girls night out of it.

[childunit]

Oh you rock. I think that one of my biggest stumbling steps is not knowing where to get materials, as ebay looks pricey (from what I've seen), but that could just be me. And how did you make the fringe belt on flickr? It is just a fabric belt with yarn sewn on? How did you choose your yarn? Like, I know enough not to get red heart for a project like this, but did you use different textures and braid them together or something? Thank you for the links!

[sunrising]

There's a great online belly dance store that sells our sizes:

http://www.moondancebellydance.com/

I'll be ordering from them in a couple weeks. :-)

[androgenie]

Moondance has plus sizes, as does http://www.flyingskirts.com (yes, more expensive, but the quality is fantastic!)

[childunit]

Ooooo post on how that goes. There are definitely some things that look awesome.

[dragonlady7]

I don't bellydance but I decided to learn to sew and there's a ton of info online about making belly dance costumes. So the "can't really sew" point is easy enough to fix-- there are literally dozens of great tutorials for making clothing online. I have several cholis that I made myself that fit great and took me a couple of hours, max-- one I hand-sewed because I was somewhere without a machine

[sunspotflares]

Not the OP, but I wanted to say thank you for the link to the choli pattern! :)

[dragonlady7]

I wear it as a summer top! I added an apron-front to it, attached with safety pins, so I don't have to show off my belly if I don't want. It's super-comfy and supports my rack-o-doom bralessly.
I haven't danced in it but I've gardened in it and not fallen out!

I had to add darts under the bust and at the side of the bust, and had to take the shoulders up. But I made it out of muslin, so it wasn't hard. (I did fully line it-- white muslin for the first test, since I'd never sewn a garment before, then I took that apart and added a second layer of white eyelet cotton for pretty, for support, and for opacity. Since no seam is longer than about six inches, it took no time at all to put together twice.) It held up to a full 17-day stint at Pennsic and some hard duty in the garden. Just be careful you get ties that aren't slippery-- I used grosgrain ribbon

[childunit]

Thanks for that pattern! I've been wanting an apron choli because it gets hot and I'm a baby about the heat, so finding a pattern that is like...explained is nice.

[byrodesigns]

Hello

[childunit]

I wish I'd gone to events, but I am like, the biggest slacker when it comes to publicly showing my support of belly dancing and stuff. I'd love to see your website once it's up, and I'll ask my (significantly more photogenic) belly dancing friends about the modeling.

[damejenn]

You can also check out http://tribes.tribe.net/shortbellyhair for short hair ideas and http://tribes.tribe.net/diycostumes for cheap ways to make things and http://tribes.tribe.net/bigbeautifultribalbellydancers for that, too. Tribe.net is sometimes a pain because it goes down alot, but when it is up you can find great community resources.
I also can tell you, since you seem to be about my size, that the XL Melodias and the 25 yd. skirts are totally worth the price. You just can't make them that good.