Horizon Zero Dawn

Being chronically behind on new game releases, it took me 2 years to finally pick up HZD, by which point Aloy was made exquisitely by many people, so I chose an outfit that I gravitated to the most, and could still be made in two phases over 3 months. That ended up being the Heavy version of Banuk Ice Hunter, because the Banuk occupy what was once Yellowstone National Park in the game, which is very nostalgic to my heart having grown up very near there. The build was also a fun and unique experience, getting to make it at the same time as my bestie Rynn Cosplay, so we shared techniques for similar parts, and built our spears together. The “medium” version of this armor was completed to shoot in Yellowstone, and “heavy” completed for Katsucon 2020.

This was a big learning experience in working with heavy leathers. Trying to keep to textiles that would have been available in the game’s story world, I kept to organic textiles (leather, silk, cotton, etc). This didn’t add too much to the overall cost surprisingly, and made it move with more accurate weight and resiliency to the elements. I learned how to do a waxed thread saddle stitch for the skirts and collar, and hand-painted the blue and turquoise gradients with leather paint. The armor and headpiece were made from EVA foam, and miscellaneous metal pieces 3D printed by friends. The headpiece was largely trial and error patterning on a mannequin head until I generally got the shape I needed. Her wig is massive and while I’m still not thrilled with it, a lot of work went into wefting 3 wigs together to get the auburn to blonde ombre. I’m especially in love with the leather pouches patterned and hand sewn by me, which are functional so I could store pieces of the costume or practical things like my phone or wallet in them! The spear is all from craft foam, crafted following Kamui Cosplay’s tutorial; fun fact: the feathers were all gathered from my parent’s farm, shed by geese/chickens/hawks.