Help on my Bandit Keith cosplay (sooo many buttons!)

September 27, 2013 9:45 PM

I've decided I will be cosplaying Bandit Keith from YuGiOh at my next convention. I've found an appropriate jean vest which I will be dying black (hard to tell if it should be black jean or leather). I'm still looking for the most patriotic bandanna in existence. But what I'm most concerned about is the shear number of gold buttons spread out on the jacket.

Here's a very nice reference photo to give you an idea of what I mean by how many buttons/studs/domes there are.

The best thing I've been able to find is this. However, I think the diameter is on the small side, but that's the largest I've seen that type of fastener go on Amazon. Any help on either sourcing appropriate button/dome/studs/etc or getting an idea of how many I would need would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

posted by gzimmer to Clothing, Beauty, & Fashion (4 answers total)

I think you might want something more like these. They're more disc-like and less like a stud. Looking at other images it seems that larger would be better. You can glue them flat on. I think what you'd really like is something like the buttons that show up in this post, but you'd probably need to either get them from button dealers (spendy) or trek around trying to find ones that were on similar sweaters but that seems closer to the look that you are going for. I think the words "blazer buttons" might help narrow stuff down. Ebay has some options but that depends how much time you have to plan.
posted by jessamyn at 10:06 PM on September 27, 2013

It would be easy to make pinback buttons with some kind of gold foil or metallic paper in them. They'd have a layer of mylar over them, but the metallic nature would still show through. And you could put them on your garment extremely easily, and they wouldn't come off.

If you don't know anybody with a button machine, send me a private message here and I'll make them for you.
posted by bink at 10:14 PM on September 27, 2013

If you use the pin back buttons, you could also use a hot glue gun to make the buttons stay flush to the fabric.
posted by catatethebird at 6:42 AM on September 28, 2013

Best answer: By the looks of the pictures, and by doing an image search myself, his studs seem to be about the size of a quarter. I think the largeness of the studs is really important in getting an accurate feel.

Buy a bag of iron-on googly eyes, and a can of metallic spraypaint.

(don't use traditional studs. Hammering them in is a total pain).
posted by FirstMateKate at 3:43 PM on September 28, 2013