It’s been a while since I’ve created any cosplay so when my daughter said she wanted to be Moana for Halloween I immediately knew I had to make a Hei Hei costume for myself!
This was my daughter’s first time being able to choose what she wanted to dress up as for Halloween and she loves Moana so it was pretty much a no brainer. I was going to sew her costume myself but then found a really great seller on Etsy that makes such affordable options so this gave me more time to focus on my Hei Hei!
The first thing I did was pick out all my feather colors. I went with satin because although it frays a little it’s not enough that it requires hemming. I also knew the internal structure of my Hei Hei cosplay was going to be based on Adam Savage’s Totoro. It’s just such a lightweight option and I love that it makes the costume collapsable. I used flat reed coil instead of rattan and just a regular paper staple gun to attach it to felt strips.
I roughly cut feather shapes from the satin, sewed them together in strips, then loosely sewed them to the body with yarn.
The head was just styrofoam balls and my husband 3D printed Hei Hei’s comb.
The feet were shaped using newspaper and masking tape attached to a pair of cheap flats. Then I used shop towels and liquid starch to add strength and structure. My daughter helped paint them.
The neck and body are two separate pieces. For the neck, a PVC pipe attaches to the styrofoam head, a shoulder support, and a helmet. The helmet adds stability to the PVC so it doesn’t pull the shoulder piece off while I’m moving. The body shape and tail is created using a metal piece that extends from my back, attached by a belt. This is actually more comfortable than it looks and allows me to literally shake a tail feather. I have my husband to thank for the manufacturing of these internal elements!
It’s definitely cumbersome with all the internal support elements and has a very limited field of vision from inside but it’s still such a fun cosplay!
