Shadowbringers is still my favorite expansion, and as I was playing it, I was sending my sister screenshots and updating her on the story. So when I had the idea for an FFXIV performance, it didn’t take much convincing. The outfit was fun and had a cool staff.

Most of the outfit is cotton with yards and yards of hand pleated details. All the eyelets were hammered in one by one and laced with suede laces. There are over 200 eyelets on this entire dress. The boots are actually leggings with faux laces and stretch pleather. The staff was also a challenge as it was a giant stick. I made this out of foam with a dyed Xmas ornament in the middle with fairy lights inside.

Related tutorials

• Dyeing plastic ornaments with food coloring
• Making wood and branches out of EVA foam

Competition info

My sister has competed with me twice as Y’shtola. The first time was a walk-on at KumoriCon and was the first time my sister had competed with me. I had only made the cosplay at that point, no accessories.

Anime Los Angeles was much more involved and her first performance as a cosplay competitor. The concept of the skit was to play out a battle that never happened. What if Ran’jit and Y’shtola had met and actually battled? So I wrote up a skit and we played it out to Lindsey Stirling music.

Competition gallery

These were taken by one of the official photographers at ALA.

Competition video

ALA is great with recording videos so you can watch our skit!

Cosplay gallery