Plush Writeup - Fishbone the "Catfish"

I loved Fishbone's design when I saw it and was thrilled that I'd be able to reuse the pattern I made for Peachy's big dino tail if I made this plush! Fishbone's friend also applied to my commission round, so I couldn't resist picking them both to see some cute pictures of them together in the future!

While she didn't require a lot of patterning from scratch, she certainly had a lot of detail in her design!
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Fishbone's tail length needed to be addressed; having it extremely long would be impractical for both shipping and display purposes. We explored having it touch the ground, but ultimately decided to keep it shorter and sticking straight out like Peachy's.

Since no new patterning was required, I could jump straight into the applique! I did a gradient on her eyes, which I'm still trying to learn to do, but I think it was effective :)

All the applique took about a week. which didn't include the applique for her ears and tailfin which I would need to pattern later.

Fishbone also has fins on the back of her arms and legs. These were mostly just color blocking, but I also sewed quilt batting into the spine to give it an extra thickness compared to the webbing part. The seam between the black and yellow was topstitched down to further "separate" the two pieces, which is one of my techniques for adding dimension; but such a small detail like this would never really be noticed.

The fins were sewn into the seams of the arms and legs for extra stability. Since Fishbone would have a full outfit, it was important to keep her fins nice and sturdy.

Fishbone has a long spine fin, which I wanted to be a single straight piece of minky sewn all the way from the base of the neck to the tail tip. While this method resulted in it being "wavy", I liked the effect as it matched her reference. If I didn't want this, I'd either have to split it into two pieces (between the back and the tail) or add darts where the tail met the body.

Pinning the spine to the body

Fishbone also has two "butt fins" at the base of her tail. These would be made with the same method as the limb fins, and sewn into the seam where the tail meets the body.

Patterning the shape

Finished spines, before sewing them into the tail seam

The big tailfin would have applique on the webbing. The spine needed to be much larger than the rest of the fins. Since the shape where it joins the tail is complex, I decided to hand sew the piece on, so I did not need to pattern it before getting the rest of the plush sewn together.

To define the transition between "spine" and "webbing" for this piece, I still topstitched on the seam between them, but this time I stuffed the spine with polyfil since it's a much bigger piece than the rest of the fins. The topstitching prevents the polyfil from spilling into the webbing area.

Patterning the tailfin

Final fin, before being sewn on

Body sewn together, pre-head!

I also used Peachy's head pattern for this plush, but my client requested larger, rounder cheeks. I didn't need to practice this, so all that needed to be patterned for her head was her ears.

I remembered that I had a short pile yellow faux fur that would look really cute in her ears! So I decided to use it. I think it's from when I was looking for pale faux fur for Lucario years ago, but it wasn't the right color. Fabric hoarding FTW once again!

I traced Fishbone's whiskers onto one large cut of minky rather than cutting them out individually and then sewing them together. It saved lots of time!

I was concerned about stability of the whiskers when I first started thinking about this project. But they ended up standing on their own completely fine, without polyfil or anything!

These whiskers would also be handsewn on.

Fishbone FLOP!

Fishbone is also my first scented plush! She has packets of aroma beads scented with "aloha" essential oils, which is a mix of tropical flower and coconut smell! It's really nice!

After stuffing her I realized her neck came out too long. I added some length because when they have a faux fur neck it can look stunted, but I went too far. This required unstuffing, taking her head off, cutting down the length of the neck by about 3/8", sewing her back together, and restuffing. But the fix was worth it!

Before neck fix

After neck fix

My client also requested magnets in her paws to hold items and so she could clasp her paws. It was my first time doing this for an anthro plush and I think it looks so cute!

She protecc...

But she also attac!

One of the final major details (but was really quite small) was hand sewing some webbing between her thumb and forefinger. I wanted this to be quite thin, so I fused together two layers of minky with Heat B' Bond and hand sewed it onto the hand. It looked effective!

​With the plush itself done, it was time to move onto her clothes.

My client requested this Lara Croft outfit, which I could do but needed to be simplified.

The jeans were simple enough to be Build A Bear. Since shoes are very difficult to make, I decided to order some Build A Bear hiking shoes, but they would need to be painted since they were a khaki color.

I bought a bundle of BaB clothes that included the dark jeans I wanted for her. Unfortunately, it seems I was mislead, as the jeans were WAY too small. Either they were shrunk or they are a different type of BaB clothes that I'm not aware of. Luckily, the bundle came with a second pair of jeans, but they were too light.

Before dyeing

After dyeing

Luckily I had navy blue RIT dye on hand (I don't even remember what I had originally purchased it for). They were easily enough to dye, but the white thread didn't dye! So I had to go over the thread with a dark fabric marker.

Again - luckily Peachy also had a hoodie, so I used her pattern for the most part. But we decided to go with a non-functional hood, so it needed to be smaller, and this outfit also had a zipper running down the front rather than a pull-over. The neckline was unique in that it had a "point" before the hood started some length back from the point, so that was the only really tricky part.

Since I had just made a faux leather jacket before my current commission round started, I also had a pattern for her own leather jacket pretty much ready to go. However, I decided to add princess seams and the yoke on the back of the jacket like Lara's for some extra detail. I really like how it looks!

I tried to add some functional 3D pockets, but they were just too bulky for what was supposed to be a sleek jacket. Instead I hit a middle ground and topstitched in the appearance of a pocket with only a 3D flap instead.

Testing out the pockets

Jacket, pre final topstitching and buttons

The shoes needed to be painted a dark brown. They were suede, so I decided to airbrush the color on because of the texture. I wanted to preserve the shininess of the eyelets, so I covered them in latex before airbrushing the shoe. I also had to cover the faux leather backing.

I bought a bunch of laces when I made Tidbit since his shoes needed new ones as well, so I also had some black laces on hand to switch out the light tan ones they came with.

It's crazy how some paint can give an object a different feel! They went from a pair of Timberland's to an adventurer's boot! Also, I love the pattern on the bottom of BaB shoes!
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My client wanted Lara's shoulder strap and gun holster too, so I decided to use leather. I first patterned the pieces with craft foam. I used leather dyes to paint them and finished them off with black streaking paint, which is wiped onto the leather and then wiped off for a nice worn look.

Buckles were attached with rivets and the items go on with a snap. All my prior experience working with leather in cosplays coming in handy!

Finally, her necklace. The pendant was also made from leather with carved details.

The pendant was painted with metallic acrylic paint and then also finished off with the black streaking paint for an antique look.

A simple leather cord was threaded through the top hole, and I attached a clasp on the ends.

With that, she was all done!

​You can watch a timelapse of sewing her below!