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Norwescon 48 Single Pattern Contest - Part 1: The Prep

Norwescon 48 is happening April 2026 and each year they host a Single Pattern Contest. Last year was my first year attending and I was mainly focused on my panels and workshops. I had time to take some artsy workshops but I didn't know about this contest until during the convention. More about the contest, from their website : "Each year, the Single Pattern Contest challenges creative, sewing, and crafting skills by choosing one pattern as the basis for your creativity! The object of the competition is to create a one-of-a-kind creation using this pattern. Some adjustments or changes to the pattern are allowed as long as the end product reflects the original pattern. Norwescon is excited to announce the two pattern options for this year’s Single Pattern Contest: this Hooded Duster Coat or McCall’s Misses’/Men’s Lined and Unlined Cape (M4139). Competition awards will include, but are not limited to, best workmanship, best use of convention theme, and best in competition. Awards...
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Fashionably Undead 2025

The MoPOP hosts an annual Fashionably Undead Halloween party. It's one night & has a costume contest, late night open exhibits, food & beverages, and DANCING. Also photo ops and other cool things like a scavenger hunt. This past year the theme was "The Goopening" and I was invited to be one of the Costume Contest Judges. It was a blast! First off, what a surreal experience. I loved seeing how creative the attendees were and everyone that entered the contest was excited to show off their work. We had a few items for judging criteria and there were a LOT of entrants. Overall, I loved seeing everyone embody their characters / costumes. The top five got to do a little runway walk to show the audience and then the winners were announced on stage as well. Since I love a good excuse to do a costume AND I was one of the costume judges I felt like I needed to make a fun goopy look for the evening. BUT it also had to be something that I could drive in, sit for a long period...
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We're Baaaaack!

Okay, apparently it's been basically 3 years since my last post here. A lot has happened. Mainly that I switched gears and went from putting all my focus on costume design to all my focus on writing. But, even with the switch, I've been working on sewing projects. I've definitely missed costuming shows. One of the big things that happened - I got to combine my love of costumes, fashion history, and body horror! My first horror poetry collection was published with Green Avenue Press back in August 2023. Fashion Trends, Deadly Ends Take a journey through a gruesome history of fashion. Rib removal, poisonous dyes, sewn eyelashes...the cost to stay in fashion. From head to toe, Brianna Malotke tells the tales of deadly fashion trends in history through beautiful poetry. It was a lot of hard work but I loved researching the history and figuring out what to pick to focus on for the final collection. I had a few smaller sections that were actually cut from the final book. Each sec...
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Mood Board for Writing Characters

The Dire Circle - " The circle is dire, much like the outcomes of these stories. In this black zodiac themed anthology, you may come to dislike other people...maybe even yourself."   When I pitched an idea for "The Dire Circle" during 2021, I wasn't sure that it would even get picked. But, once it did and I was given a Black Zodiac to then develop my short story, I decided to do what I do for costuming a character - I made a mood board for my main character.  My Black Zodiac was the Serpent and my short story for the anthology is Twisted Tales, Dripping in Honey . My story centered around a very femme fatale main character with lots of buried secrets. I looked to old Hollywood glamour, dark reds, demon eyes, and other glints of seductress mixed with sweetness to create Melia . For me, coming up with a name was very difficult. After creating what should would look like, having an idea of her voice, her outfits, her drive, everything about her, I still needed the...
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"She Kills Monsters" - Padded Armor Piece

Here is a quick breakdown of how I made a padded armor piece for the character Tilly when she's her D&D character, Tillius the Paladin, in the play, "She Kills Monsters."  For reference, here are my Tillius the Paladin Mood Boards: First step was using the actor's measurements I created a very basic front and back bodice pattern. I wanted the armor piece to be comfortable, slightly bigger, and the padded would provide the texture look I was aiming for with the overall piece. It would be worn over a long sleeve t-shirt and the actor would be wearing a belt over it that held the sword. Also worn over top would be a one-armed shoulder armor piece that would be black leather with silver accents. So, while a majority of the outfit was black (base layer, boots, belt, gloves) I wanted this armor piece to be more grey and scream texture to the audience.  Above: I cut out the front and back pieces in the grey fabric for the outer layer as well as striped fabric for the li...
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Malotke Writes - Updated Website

Guess who got new headshots done? Me! I've been continuing to submit various written pieces (poems, drabbles, flash fiction, short stories, etc.) and have been needing headshots for some of the submissions. Since I have been using my photo from senior year of college (shot for the fashion show program) I had decided that maybe it was time for some new, and way more recent, photos.  Pictured left is one of my favorite photos from the photography session. I've already updated my website using a bunch of the photos and I've sent them off for social media / marketing for upcoming interviews & anthologies that I'm included in.  Here is a link to my writing website: Malotke Writes
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"She Kills Monsters" - Demon Wings

In "She Kills Monsters" there are two evil cheerleader characters, Evil Gabi & Evil Tina. For this show I wanted them to have almost identical outfits for when they played the evil versions. Their look included matching cheerleader outfits, shoes, little black horns, and wings. Then one girl would wear black contacts and the other would wear sunglasses (she couldn't do contacts). This post is about the wings. For the wings I purchased two sets of two sizes of black wings. Then I removed the black glitter elastic straps from all the pairs of wings. Next was placing the small set on the "top" of the larger set. I had to hand sew them together due to the wiring in the wings & the thickness of the wing material.  See above for a photo on sewing the wings together. After sewing the two sizes together I cut and sewed new, white elastic straps to the wings. The cheer tops are white so I was hoping to hide the elastic as much as possible. After that the wings we...
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