Tag Archives: harry potter

Pop’s Top 10: Literary Gowns

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Remember when this dress premiered on the Eras Tour? We do! The custom Vivienne Westwood gown is filled with different handwritten versions of the phrase “I love you, it’s ruining my life,” a lyric from Track 1 of Tay’s 2024 album, The Tortured Poets Department. It inspired us to seek out more artists and designers who took literary fashion to the next level. So today we present Pop’s Top 10 literary gowns!

#1 GONNA BE GOLDEN

Created by Ryan Jude Novelline, the artist stitched together the colorful illustrations from discarded Little Golden Books, and fashioned a bodice from the spines. If you’d like to read an interview about his amazing creation, please follow this link.

#2 BOOK WITCH

From Reddit

Posted on Reddit, the detailing on this dress is off the charts! Plus, the hat! The HAT.

#3 SUPER SEUSS

Created by Rebecca Humes, the Seuss-specific shredded tutu and bouncy book characters on springs is delightfully whimsical!

#4 DISNEY DANCER

Another dress by Rebecca Humes. But this one was created from Disney books and features a skirt composed of thousands of chain links. WOW!

#5 POTTER PROM

Hailey Skoch rustled her way to her Arkansas senior prom in a dress made from multiple volumes of Harry Potter books! You can read more about her process here.

#6 FANTASTIC FAIRY

Winner of cutest, most adorable wings and folded tutu is this phenomenal book fairy!

#7 VOLUMINOUS VOLUMES

This distinct dress with a colonial flare was created by White Knight Cosplay. And just look at that teacup broach!

#8 FAIRY TALE FASHIONISTA

A stack of unwanted volumes transformed into a fairy tale worthy dress by Helen Hobden, who also entered it in a contest judged by Maisie Williams! Read more about her adventure here.

#9 BOUND TO IMPRESS

French designer Silvie Facon created this flowing masterpiece from old leather spines that had separated from books. It took 250 hours! More more extensive photos, plus more dresses, please follow this link.

#10 SHORT STORY

Silvie Facon also created this sassy little folded dress, again by only using books that were beyond repair. For more details, please see this link.

Feeling inspired but also maybe a tad overwhelmed by the sheer volume of talent? No worries! You can craft this simple origami newsprint dress by following the instructions here.

Pssst! We also made a Cinderella dress out of highly unusual materials! See that here.

Tiny Potter

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In addition to being super into show jumping story times, freaked out by clowns, and unusually influenced by a cookbook, I really really REALLY love miniatures (ask my daughter about my obsession with dollhouse cakes). So when MGA’S Mini Verse released a “Wizarding World: Harry Potter Make it Mini Potions Class” set, I was beyond thrilled to enter the miniature world of Hogwart’s.

The set, which is intended for ages 8+ and contains over 100+ pieces, retails for around $30. I’ll say it from the jump…the quality of the materials in this set was outstanding. The pieces were good quality plastic, felt substantial, had a lot of details, and were really pleasing to work with. Everything was packed extraordinarily well, with easy instructions printed on the outside of each of the parts containers.

However, there was one set of instructions floating free inside the box. While it did say “Read Me First!” in big letters, I honestly almost missed the piece of paper as I unpacked everything. Good thing I did spot it because it had all the information about resin, glue, and potions. I’m not sure why these instructions weren’t incorporated with the others. It would have been much easier to construct everything that way.

I must also say…this set puts you to WORK! One of the first steps is to lay each individual classroom floor tile using a pot of glue (cleverly disguised as a wooden bucket) and a mini float (which yes, know I am technically holding the wrong way in the photo).

I also had to lay each brick on the walls, using more glue and a mini trowel. Like the floor tiles, the spaces for the bricks were individually numbered, so matching each to its assigned space was easy.

At this point, I was honestly looking for Dobby the house elf to help me out. But I forged on, snapping together the pieces for the two bookcases, work table, and arranging all the little bottles and jars.

When the classroom was finished, it was time for the main event: concocting the mini potion! You had a choice of two: purple or teal. Following the instructions, I gathered all the equipment and ingredient bottles.

To make a potion, you have to pour the powder into the resin inside the cauldron, stir it, use tongs to add some color beads to an empty bottle, funnel the purple resin into said bottle which you then seal and tie a label on. What could possibly go wrong? Ummmmmmm…

Oh, I made a mess. The purple powder went everywhere, I dropped the funnel, everything got all over my fingers, my shirt, my desk. Snape would have absolutely deducted 50 points from Ravenclaw for my potions ineptitude. But when it was finally complete, it was a very pretty potion. I’m not sure if the resin was ultimately supposed to harden, but weeks later, the potion is still sloshing around in the bottle. So caretakers with curious children who like to unbottle things be warned. You may want to keep this particular potion far out of reach.

The amount of labor, glue, resin, and general potential for messiness leads me to suggest that this set for kids ages 10+ (but ok for 8 year-olds with adult assistance). As I mentioned before, the details on the set are exquisite and it’s fun to arrange and re-arrange the miniatures. This would be fantastic for a Harry Potter fan, and a great art kit to boot. 4.75 out of 5!

Charmed, I’m Sure!

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Professor Flitwick is going to be thrilled, because this post is all about charms! When we learned that Malaysia, one of our awesome high school summer interns, was a huge Harry Potter fan, we just knew this kit was hers to test! Accio bracelet!

The “Harry Potter Clay Charms” kit by Klutz is intended for ages 8+ and retails for about $25. Contents include an instructional manual, 7 types of clay, a sculpting tool, a mini marker, a bracelet and hardware, a small bottle of glaze, and a paper display stand that looks like the Hogwarts Express.

The instructional manual was particularly good, chock full of full color photos, ideas, and instructions for making up to 29 characters, objects, and creatures from the famous series. I will now turn the post over to Malaysia, and don’t miss the interview with her at the end of the post. Take it away, Malaysia!

Upon opening this kit, I was pleasantly surprised with the amount of materials and inspiration provided to make these charms! The booklet gave great tips on handling the clay, tips on making shapes, and even color mixing for certain shades. As for the clay itself, the quantity for each color ranges, with blue being the least, and black and gold having the most. I’d suggest letting the clay sit out for a few minutes at room temperature to soften it a bit before handling, but it wasn’t too hard to use.

The first charm I tried my hand at was Hermione Granger, and after twenty minutes spent on her hair alone, I was regretting my decision. While she was the only human character I tried, I think it’s safe to assume the others would be of similar difficulty. There were a lot of components to the human characters, so save them for last – or first – depending on your level of patience.

Most of the other charms were fairly easy, and seem fit for the hands of someone 8 and above. Aside from the mandrake, the rest of the charms were quite simple and easy to make presentable, or resemble the photos from the book in some way. I’d recommend working with darker colors first, then progressing to the lighter ones, because once they mix…there’s no undoing it! Also, some of the coloring can rub off onto your workspace or your fingers.

Back to the dreaded Mandrake: while adorable and misleadingly simple, it’s actually quite hard to get right! Turns out, it’s a bit of a challenge to make balls of clay look effortlessly perfect as this plant. I tried using the clay shaping tool provided with the kit for a bit of assistance, but I wasn’t too successful. By this point, there was a fair bit of clay stuck onto the blade, which was stubbornly difficult to remove. The other tools (marker, charm hoops, and glaze) were simple and easy to use. Dr. Dana cooked the charms in her oven, I glazed them, and then I attached them to the bracelet:

Overall, this charm kit has earned a ⅘ star rating in Muggle terms. It’s hard not to have fun trying to perfectly recreate these beloved icons in clay form, or even just to laugh at your mistakes! So, in wizarding terms, I’ll have to give this an E in their O.W.Ls for Exceeding Expectations!

We absolutely loved having Malaysia in the office this summer, laughing and talking about Potter. So naturally, I couldn’t let her go without asking a few Potter-related questions…

What House are you?

Slytherin, proudly.

What’s your favorite book in the series and why?

Half-Blood Prince. With Voldemort really coming back, it’s a bit funny (and relatable) to see Harry and the other students balancing their teenage lives while also trying to plan on defeating He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. On a smaller note, I think it’s one of the first times we see some vulnerability in the haughtier characters like Draco, which really just puts it into perspective that this magical, whimsical world we all love is going to take a darker turn.

Which character do you associate with the most and why?

It’s probably cliché, but Hermione Granger. I can be a bit of a know-it-all at times, even when it seemingly backfires. And even to this day, one of my worst fears is getting a bad grade…or worse, expelled.

Which charm in this kit speaks to you the most, and why?

I liked the Deathly Hallows charm the most, it’s an instantly recognizable sign of the Harry Potter universe, without being too elaborate or difficult.