Anansi Girls? Spinning a cobweb tutu

I’m always inspired by other great artists, and one of my favorite writers is Neil Gaiman. I just finished reading his novel Anansi Boys this week, which is all about the spider god Anansi and his two sons, Fat Charlie and Spider. There also happens to be a bit of a spider invasion going on at our house, so I’ve had arachnids on the brain for a week or so now. The “final strand” in my cobweb tutu design came together when I was looking through my fabric remnant pile, and re-discovered some web-patterned netting from a goth-inspired Little Miss Muffet dress I made a few years ago. The pieces were in place – now to get sewing!

I choose black, eggplant and lavender tulle for this project. The web netting really needed a layer of something light in color underneath to show off the pattern – it was lost with just black beneath it.

Once the skirt was put together, I started adding sequins to the spider webbing for sparkle. That looked pretty good, but the star of the show was missing. I needed a spider, and the plastic ones you get at Halloween would not do. I had some faceted black buttons that came off a thrift-store project skirt, so I used one for the head. I found another fancy button for the body, and made the legs out of silver seed and bugle beads. I tried sewing them directly onto the netting, which was a BIG mistake. Thank goodness I tried it out first on a scrap first. I would have cried if I ruined all my hard work on that skirt on the last step like that.

Instead of sewing, I used some super fine-gauge wire to build the legs and wire the two buttons together. After a few misfires (it was my first crack at using beads and wire like that), I had a really good looking spider.

So there you have it – a cobweb tutu just in time for All Hallow’s Eve. It will be making its way north to Nymbol’s Secret Garden very soon!