Wanda Cobar — Chicago Costume Designer
(L-R) Wanda Cobar and Alex Duffy of Duffy Dossier.
Wanda Cobar — Chicago Costume Designer.
After walking up a few flights of stairs to the second floor of Wanda’s home-studio, I entered into one of the biggest and bestest rooms I’ve ever been in: HER SEWING ROOM. Boxes on boxes of fabrics, button drawers, patterns and clothing racks were EVERYWHERE. Truly, it was heaven.
Back Mesh Lightening Bolt Blouse by Wanda Cobar
Wanda’s glowing gown she designed back in 2016.
Wanda had a few of her David Bowie inspired costumes on mannequins in one corner of her studio — and the sheer black mesh lightening-bolt blouse I fell in love with in another (pictured right). And directly in the center of Wanda’s studio was a creative gown project she worked on back in 2016. It was a gown that lit up from the inside! It took over a month to build, an electrician and 3 seamstresses’ hands to complete (pictured below). Amazing!
It took over a month to build, an electrician and 3 seamstresses’ hands to complete. Amazing!
Because were women, we got to talking right away. Off the record — Wanda told me about her business and success selling niche costume wear on her Etsy Shop. (Which, by the way, she has TWO Etsy shop’s. 1 for her fashion and 1 for her costumes and dance-wear.)
Wanda told me the turning point for her business’s growth was in 2015, when Katy Perry preformed at the Superbowl. Katy sported a beach ball-themed costume dress alongside the famous “left shark.”
Wanda thought to herself, “I could make that. I can make Katy’s beach ball costume.”
With Wanda’s excellent experience working with spandex and stretchy materials — she thought to herself, “I could make that. I can make Katy’s beach ball costume.” And that’s just what she did. Before you knew it, Wanda’s Etsy Shop was blowing up with made-to-order requests for her rendition of Katy’s Superbowl dress.
Wanda told me one of her favorite parts within all of the success — the stylist behind “Live with (former) Michael and Kelly” got ahold of Wanda’s Katy costume and dressed Kelly in the design for the daytime TV show’s Halloween episode:
Pretty cool, huh?
I talked to Wanda about a few more exciting things: how Chicago’s influenced her own personal style as well as both of her clothing brands, what her plans are for the next fashion collection and exactly how she found her niche …
xo, Duffy
