Introduction:
If you've ever wanted to try your hand at fashion design, here's your chance. This is a perfect time to think about your costume. Fashion design is just one of the many exciting careers in the arts.

Materials:

• Cardstock Figure Templates
• Pencils and erasers
• Markers and colored pencils
• White bond paper 9x12 or larger
• Optional: glitter, feathers, decorative paper for collage, paint

Directions:
1. The first thing you need to do is draw the outline of a human figure onto your paper. If you are doing this lesson at home you may not need to make a template. However, if you are working with more than one or two children, a figure template is useful. You can use manufactured plastic templates, like Pickett #1140I (male) and 1141I (female), to make many more cardstock templates for the children to use. Or you can simply draw the outline of a figure onto your paper before you begin designing the costume. Draw one figure facing forward and one facing to the side.

2. Once you have your figures drawn, think about the motif of your costume. Do you want to be an animal, a plant, a superhero? Once you have a clear idea about the general details about your costume, begin drawing. Leave no details out. Include headware, face paint if any, masks, and all the details about your costume that will make it the most interesting. Color in your costume with colored pencils and markers and as an added option, decorate with glitter, feathers, or anything else you can collage!

Art Terms:
Template – a draftsman's pattern or guide for drawing certain standard shapes and symbols. A template is essentially a flat sheet, usually made of heavy plastic in which holes of the shape or shapes desired have been cut in different sizes. The draftsman uses the template as a stencil.
Collage – the technique of creating a pictorial composition in two dimensions or very low relief by gluing paper, fabrics, or any natural or manufactured material to a canvas, panel, or paper, or any work of art produced in this manner.
Motif – the defining or dominant theme or idea (in a painting or sculpture).

Resources:
Mayer, Ralph. The Harper Collins Dictionary of Art Terms and Techniques. Harper Collins Publishers, New York. 1991.

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