The King Has Lost His Crown

Continuing my series of remaking ABBA's black 1978 costumes, I've finally gotten around to finishing Bjorn's outfit.  Bjorn's outfit is fairly simple: a black jumpsuit (that he never takes the jacket off of, so I have no idea if it's sleeveless or not lol), a bolero, a belt, and boots.

As I've mentioned, there aren't a lot of good quality photos of these particular outfits, so that makes finding close up reference photos of all the details pretty complicated.  On the front of the jacket (I don't know if there are lapels on the jacket since the outfit is all black so it's hard to see if there are any, so I just opted to not add any), there's a lot of embroidery, even some tassels at the bottom.  Same for the belt.

I did my best to recreate all the little details for Bjorn's outfit, and I think it came out decent enough.  I'm not too crazy about the belt, but I also couldn't do any better since I could not get any zoomed in, sharp images of the pattern on his belt.

Before I show you the completed outfit, I want to share an image of my 2nd attempt at this outfit.  (I cannot find any pictures of the first one, but if I remember correctly, I did not make his jacket a bolero, and it may have been sleeved as well because I did not have enough fabric.)

This time I made sure to make the jacket a bolero.  For the silver details, as usual, I glued on sequins in various sizes.  I could not figure out how the front of his jacket closed at the time, so I didn't have any closure in the front.  It made his jacket fall off a lot. xD  Also if you notice I didn't make a belt.  Technically it's not really necessary since I'm fairly certain he didn't wear it all the time, but it's still an element of his outfit.

And now, the new one:

For the detailing/embroidery/whatever you call it, I used a combination of glass beads and silver thread.  I actually did the details on one side twice because I wasn't happy with how it turned out.  Don't ask me what the thing on the belt is - I have no idea either, but I made something that resembled whatever it is I could see on the pictures I have.

A better look at the details on the jacket, including the tassels.  Also I used a hook and eye in the front to close the jacket.

A better look at the belt design. :P  Not the best, but not the worst.

Also the belt closes in the back with velcro.

And his boots.

Overall, I'm extremely happy with how Bjorn's outfit came out.  It's so much better than the first two versions, and I'm happy to have finally made a version of this outfit that I'm proud of.

Anyways, that's 3/4 outfits done.  Next week I should have a post on Benny's outfit up!