Fun and Unique Marionette and Puppet Master Couple Costume

I wanted to find a completely unique and different costume that hasn’t been recreated too much, and my husband and I decdied the marionette get up would be a fun thing to try. I was nervous it would be kind of a boring costume, but once we created the makeup for the marionette doll, we thought it looked quite different. This costume was surely a process, but was a wonderful journey and full of suprises.

The first thing we wanted to create was the “mood” of the costume. We thought if we should go funny, cute, or scary. We thought the creepy aspect was different for the both of us, and wanted to explore it further.

The dress was one I have had at home, and we thought the peter pan collar was a nice touch of vintage. We wanted to link it together somehow, so we got the plaid bowtie to match at a local thrift store. The bowler hat and gloves were the other things that were purchased for the costume, the other was fun and creation time!

We had a lot og discussion as to how we would create the look of the marionette. We tossed around endless ideas. I’ll explain how we ended up doing it. We took a black headband, screwed onto it a wooden painted circle with a glued and inserted dowel. My husband cut out two pieces of wood each 6 inches, drilled in a hole into the center to place over the dowel, and holes on the edges for the yarn. We attached yarn to the four edges of the wood, and to the center piece to give it the look that the head is being raised too. We thought it would be cool to throw it off a bit and make the dowel asymetrical on the headband. The wooden sticks were glued together, and the hole was cut so the woodedn peice could be removed and actually used! I tied the yarn to my middle fingers and back of my boots after cut to length.

The makeup took QUITE some time to apply! (5.5 hours worth) It is an optical illusion, and the bottom lip has white eye shadow applied with black liquid eyeliner for the teeth, black eye shadow beneath the lips, with red lipstick at the base. The eyes are created with white eye shadow beneath the eyes, and fake eyelashes cut in half to create the look of a doll. I then added “joints” to my wrists and elbows. I loved creating this illusion! When I would go to the bathroom and see myself in the mirror, I got scared every time!!

We got a lot of fun reactions to our costumes! One girl asked if I was real, which gave us a fun giggle, and I got asked if my makeup was a mask or sticker type of thing. People seemed shocked from our costumes, and we got a lot of compliments all night that we had the best cotume they’ve seen! It was wonderful working together as husband and wife on this, and creating something together. Hope you all enjoy! Thank you! (Let me know if you wanted anymore photos as well!)