Makers name: Amanda Purnell

The Lopunny Cosplay is inspired by the Pokemon™ series and offers a personified rendition of the character Lopunny. Lopunny is a large rabbit-like Pokemon known for its adorable giant ears, soft fur, and powerful kicks dealt by its strong legs. PokeballOYarn sought to capture the main physical features and fighting-spirit of Lopunny using a combination of different clothing styles, yarn textures, and stitch patterns.

The design for this cosplay started with a series of sketches (done by @obsidiangold on Instagram) to establish its overall appearance and identify the major textures that needed to be captured by the crocheted fabric. PokeballOYarn and ObsidianGold chose to highlight the agile nature of Lopunny by giving the cosplay a thief-like appearance. A hooded scarf provided a means to represent Lopunny’s long ears and a location for placing its large fuzzy eyebrows. Arm warmers served as a way to symbolize the patches of fur around its wrists. The original design utilized a skirt, but to mimic the curve of Lopunny’s legs the final design featured harem pants modeled after those worn by the Gerudo thieves in Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time™.

Acrylic yarn was chosen for this cosplay because of its durability, washability, wide array of color choices, and variety of available textures. Worsted weight yarn in brown and ecru were used to create the crop top, pants, scarf, and arm warmers. Bulky weight eyelash yarn in cream was used to create the fur trim on the scarf and arm warmers. The majority of the cosplay was created using the American double-crochet stitch. Rib-stitching was added to the pants waist and scarf border to provide texture and contrast. A grid stitch was added to the crop top to provide texture and help the cosplayer stay cool. The eyebrow accessories added to the scarf required the American single-crochet due to their spiked shape and tight curves.

The Lopunny Cosplay serves as an example of PokeballOYarn’s “modular everyday cosplay” style. PokeballOYarn creates crocheted cosplay outfits featuring pieces that can be worn individually with every-day clothing. This allows crocheted pieces to be reused outside of conventions in order to maximize their value. For example, the hooded scarf and arm warmers are often worn during the Fall and Winter while the crop top is worn during the Spring and Summer.