My family loves to cosplay, and I do too. However, despite being a former children’s event planner, I lack a lot of the crafting skills and sewing skills to make my own. Therefore, I channel my creativity in other ways. Because Star Wars is my favorite obsession, I wanted to share how to do some simple Star Wars Cosplay ideas for those of you who can’t sew or aren’t crafty in that way, like me!
How to Find Materials for Star Wars Cosplays
Since I can’t sew well, I look for items I can use as a starter piece. Usually, I find these at Hot Topic or Torrid. Since, I try to keep everything budget friendly, I wait until things go on sale or clearance. When I did my Ella Vader (Pin Up Darth Vader), I found the dress at Torrid for under $20. Then I pieced together the rest using thrift stores, a small boutique for the hair bow, and Amazon for the pettiskirt.
Where else to Look
Thrift stores provide a treasure trove of odds and ends that you can use to create a costume. Even if you can’t sew, you can glue some things together to get the desired effect. I also shop clearance sales at Target and Walmart to get accessories. That is how I ended up with several lightsabers by the way!
For wigs, Amazon has pretty much the best selection, at least of the budget friendly variety. Some of them even come with caps, which always makes me happy. Just make sure you invest in a decent brush and store them properly.
I also recommend using small boutiques when you can. For pin up inspired cosplays, I always get my hair flowers from small businesses, either at a vendor event or online on Etsy.
My best advice, as always for anything, is to have a budget and shop around to get what you need to put together your whole look!
My favorite Star Wars Cosplay Ideas
When my 14 year old was younger, we came up with the idea of Princess Vader for a comic con. We combined their favorite Disney Princess, A Darth Vader lightsaber, and Darth Vader Mask. It was so much fun, and they got a lot of use out of it.
I have done several Star Wars Cosplays, but my two favorites are Ella Vader and my Steampunk Kylo Ren cosplays.
Ella Vader (Pin Up Darth Vader)
As you know, pin up is a big part of who I am. A few years ago for a cosplay contest, I found a Darth Vader dress on clearance and thought it would be fun to create a Star Wars pin up persona. I found an R2D2 purse at Hot Topic, a Darth Vader hair flower at a vendor fair, and got a pettiskirt from Amazon. I didn’t win the contest, but everyone thought it was a cute idea. Since then, I have done Ella Vader for a few other comic cons and for Akron Pride when I participated in the march with some friends. Ella is definitely a lot of fun!
Steampunk Kylo Ren
When Episode 7 came out, Torrid came out with this really cool Star Wars line, and the Kylo Ren dress was part of that. I loved the dress. When it went on clearance, I snatched it up. I had no idea what I was going to do with it, but I absolutely loved it.
As someone with a decent sized lightsaber collection, I really wanted one of the fancy Kylo Ren lightsabers they sold at Toys R Us…you know the ones that were like $200…but of course, spending that much for one was out of my budget. However, when they had their going out of business sale, I found one super cheap!
I knew I wanted to do a Kylo Ren cosplay, but I wanted it to be unique. So I thought the idea of a steampunk Kylo Ren was a great idea. I made a list of the look I wanted. It took me about 6 months to put it all together, but I managed to come up with my Steampunk Kylo Ren look. My favorite thing about this one is that some of the pieces can be interchanged with other cosplays I do. This one is by far my favorite cosplay though, and I get a lot of compliments when I do this one too!
The Wrap Up
Just because you can’t sew or aren’t crafty doesn’t mean you can’t cosplay. Cosplay is for everyone after all, and it is meant to be fun. Just remember to be creative and have fun with what you do!
I hope you enjoyed my Star Wars Cosplay ideas! Be sure to check out some of my other Star Wars fun, like the Baby Yoda Oreos!
there are a lot of great ideals and suggestion here that I never would have thought about thanks
These are great ideas. I really like the steampunk Kylo Ren.