The Costuming of a Stop-motion Puppet

I'm working on a new project, another one based on Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream", but one quite different from "Titania Sleeps". For this new one, my "Everyman" puppet, Eric Generic, must take on the guise of the Bard himself. (Eric will be getting his own page very soon, showing his many faces ***UPDATE - new page added, on right sidebar!). Having a ready-made puppet awaiting tranformation is really wonderful - even if Eric has no legs!
One of my favourite parts of planning a project is outfitting the puppets. I used to make full-sized costumes for children's theatre, on absolutely no budget and with only my imagination and a general understanding of Renaissance garb to go on. I also made many costumes for an Early Music ensemble I once belonged to, so it was time to launch into the miniaturised version of all of those outfits made years ago! These are (and were) in no way historically accurate (metal grommets!), but the whole idea is theatrical intent and giving a cartoony impression of the era....because it is what it is.
When planning the doublet, I simply dug into my scrap box (that's one of the really nice things about puppets - you always have enough cloth!) and began cutting.

The doublet cut out; also the miniature ruff I made earlier (note the quarter for size). You can also see Eric's hand (he just got new ones)!

 [A note on the ruff - full-sized ones are a lot more time-consuming but a lot LESS frustrating to make than miniature ones!]

Costuming in miniature is a lot easier if you can use fusible interfacing (to stiffen flimsy material and keep it from fraying ) and heat-bond strips (to hold small pieces in place before sewing).

Interfacing on material and heat bond applied to strips of ribbon.

Sew everything together (sleeves are a pain at the best of times; in miniature they are pure nastiness):

Basic doublet sewn together

Fit to the puppet, tweak, add details like eyelets (unfortunately, they are huge, but adds to the cartoony feel), lacing, reversed cuffs, wig (another job unto itself!), jewellery and shoulder details, and you have Eric Generic as Shakespeare:

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