Duct Tape Dress Form

I have wanted to make this custom dress form for a while now, but have been back and forth between asking a crafty sewing friend to help who would better understand what I wanted out of this project or getting my husband to help out.  I finally went with my husband for two reasons: 1. He’s at hand and 2. With all the groping that is necessary for this project, he’s pretty much the only person I’m comfortable with handling it.  We decided to tackle this last night and it was actually pretty easy for my husband to handle.  We used one monster roll of generic brand duct tape, probably the equivalent of 2-3 regular rolls of silver until I had a nice suit of armor 2 or more layers of tape thick.  This is my body armor look:

Once we finished off the monster roll, we started to cover the form in a final layer of decorative pink polka dot tape that ran out with maybe half the form finished.  I got the decorative roll from Michaels, it’s name brand Duck Tape.  They have some other adorable patterns but all these printed Duck Brand Duct Tape are smaller rolls, maybe half the size of a regular roll but at the same price.  While I probably use up more tape than a size 0 might, I’m still guessing 3 or more rolls and if you want a decorated outer layer, at least 2 of the small printed Duck tape rolls will be needed.   

The whole project was pretty simple, cut 4 -6 inch strips, some longer ones for the waist, and just keep taping keeping things as close as you can without feeling like you’re cinching anything in.  The whole process took about 3 hours with me helping by tearing tape when I could.  This was a very warm outfit from the moment we put plastic wrap on my neck and only got hotter under the tape layers.  I also should have been wearing some comfy shoes rather than standing barefoot on the floor.  My husband had a hard time cutting it off in a straight line but otherwise it looks great!  I’ll admit that for some reason I was thinking it would magically stand on its own alone but it needed some internal support to keep from falling down.  I put it on a hanger and remembered we had an old speaker stand that will probably become the base of this thing permanently.  I was ready for bed after cutting that thing off so I left the hanger delicately balanced on the speaker stand and called it a day.  Without being taped back together, the form kind of pulled in around the chest making it look like a fake pregnancy belly which creeped out my husband… 

Next step – stuffing!!!