The Costume Goddess Tells All:
Arm Costume for Bellydancers

Title	The Costume Goddess Tells All: Arm Costume for Bellydancers
Author	Dina Lydia
ISBN	None
Publisher	Dina Lydia & Blair Johnson
Category	Nonfiction: Costume Instruction
Shira's Rating	(On a scale of 0 to 5)

What It's About

This is Volume 4 in a series of books about belly dance costuming written by Dina Lydia, The Costume Goddess. In this installment, Dina offers inspiration and instructions for a variety of belly dance costume pieces that can be worn on the arms, including sleeves, armbands, and gloves.

The book opens with a photo gallery showing assorted dancers modeling their costumes with assorted arm decorations. In all, the gallery features 34 pictures of different arm garments.

The next section talks about different body issues such as heavy versus thin arms, long verus short, small versus large bust, and how to decide which type of arm costuming might be most flattering for each of these areas. This is followed by a brief review of sewing tools and techniques.

From here the book moves forward with its instructional section. It covers different kinds of sleeves, armbands, gloves, and drapes. For each item, it offers basic instructions on how to make it, how to decorate it, and how to vary the basic concept for different looks. This section is illustrated with many drawings showing how to create the patterns and assemble them.

This book is shorter than some of Dina's other Costume Goddess books. However, she also charges a lower price for it, so it still offers reasonable value for the money.

Its Good Points

The book offers a large variety of creative ideas for arm costuming, some that would cover the arm and others that would merely accent it. Troupes looking for costume ideas could use the suggestions in this book to create an original look for their ensemble, and solo dancers will find many ideas for enhancing their costumes to differentiate themselves from the ranks of people wearing mass-produced Egyptian bra/belt/skirt sets. People with specific figure issues will find helpful ideas on how to use costuming on the arms to disguise problem areas and enhance attractive features.

Throughout the book, as Dina gives instructions for particular garments, she points out situations where they might not be appropriate. These might include cases where the garment would not be flattering, as well as particular styles of dancing where the sleeve might interfere.

People without much sewing experience might not know which fabrics drape softly versus which are crisp. For many garments, Dina advises which fabrics would work well and warns against those that would not be suitable.

The book is organized very well. Similar garments are grouped together, typically with the instructions for the easiest one appearing first, and then more complex variations of it following. While reading it, I felt like it flowed very cleanly and logically.

When appropriate, Dina includes detailed drawings illustrating how to draft pattern pieces and assemble them into finished costume items. Many photographs show how the completed items look when worn.

The book is attractively designed. The extensive drawings and photos make it visually appealing, and it is laid out in a way that is clear and easy to read. Although I found myself wishing for an index a few times, the table of contents contains enough detail to navigate around most of the time.

Although the majority of photos feature Dina herself wearing garments she created, she includes a large selection of photos showcasing other dancers modeling their own unique arm costuming pieces. These dancers represent a diverse collection of body types and costuming visions, to help you visualize what might look good on you.

Many of Dina's suggestions are easy enough for people who are beginners at sewing. Although I wouldn't recommend items requiring circles or gathering for sewing newcomers, there are many items that use simple techniques.

On The Negative Side....

The structure of this book didn't quite work for me. As I paged through the opening 24 pages of photo gallery, I found myself wondering when I was going to get to the primary "meat" of the book. Later in the book, there were instructions for garments that did not include photos of how the finished pieces looked - items that I later discovered were featured in the opening photo gallery. I think the book would have worked better with my brain if more of the photos had been sprinkled later in the book adjacent to the text that described how to make the items they pictured.

Like many other belly dancing books, this one is bound with plastic spiral binding. Although this binding does help keep the cost of the book down, it takes more space on my bookshelf than other binding types and it's hard for me to tell which book is which when I'm looking at the spines of several spiral-bound books side-by-side.

In Conclusion

Every dancer who would like to wear some kind of costuming on her arms should refer to this book for ideas. Whether your taste leans toward sleeves, gloves, armbands, drapes, or other decorations, you'll find many creative ideas in this book with detailed instructions on how to make them. I recommend it.

To contact the author:

Dina Lydia
P.O. Box 30878
Seattle,WA 98103-0878

Email: dina@costumegoddess.com
Web Site: http://www.costumegoddess.com/

Reviews of Other Books by the Same Author

Disclosure

Dina is a significant contributor of information to this web site. She writes the Ask the Costume Goddess column, which contains many articles about belly dance costuming. I consider her to be a friend.