This weekend I attended the third (?) annual SalonCon in Somerset, New Jersey. I went for a chance to hang out with and to catch a glimpse of amazing costumes. And to wear the dress that ate the last week of my life.

I achieved all three of those things, so in that sense the con was an unmitigated success. However, there was a lot going on, and not all of it was great, so SalonCon gets a List.

+ Steampunk convention on the East Coast!
- In a single hallway of a Holiday Inn with super-door-alarm constant-bleep action!
+ The costumes were amazing!
- Not a lot of compliments being thrown around. One woman actually seemed peeved that I complimented her outfit.
+ They had a costume contest so that everyone could see the amazing costumes!
- The winners of the costume contest were close friends of the sole judge! (No one seemed surprised at the outcome.)
+ Staff were very sweet.
- Staff were very underinformed.
+ They had lovely items for sale!
- Of which Weird Tales, Cathrynne Valente’s books, and The Alchemy of Stone were the only ones that involved reading.
+ They invited a great steampunk band to play!
- And set them up with what sounded like a boombox.
+ People were very polite!
- People were very subdued. There was a lot of walking around and looking good, not so much conversation.

Not that I had a bad time; by and large I enjoyed myself. I think I’ve just been spoiled by writing conferences, which have a different energy, usually involving talking. But again, it’s just a difference of taste, because I’m a lot better at yapping than I am at walking around and looking good.

Especially since my boots were uncomfortable and I clomped my way into an enormous blister. Worth it, though; those boots are fun. I will be wearing them far more often than is good for me.

While I was there I even found a new boyfriend!

When I first saw him I clutched Ekaterina’s arm (we took turns getting the vapors all day) and hissed, “Best guys’ costume all day!”

Then I found out he was with Abney Park and it was his JOB to look really super-steampunky. Oh well; it worked, imaginary boyfriend whose name is apparently Daniel! Nice job with the bass playing, which I gather is your instrument! Thumbs up!

Also, I own that brown belt, too. I wore it that same day. We’re like twins! Who shop at Target. (Thanks for the belt, Target! You’re my other boyfriend.)

Now, to the important thing: the outfits.

Ekaterina and I managed THREE outfits EACH during the course of the day, which still makes me insanely proud and happy, because my wardrobe is 90% black knit shirts and 10% awesome things I never wear, so it was nice to reverse that and have a day of 90% fun clothes.

Here’s the first outfit I wore, which was the “gentlemanly” one. The second one was far more steampunky, but I forgot to take a picture of it. I also forgot to photograph the third one.

(I am not the photoblogger you want on a desert island – there will be one picture of the wreckage and maybe a picture of your bones picked clean by vultures, but otherwise I will totally forget to document anything.)

Anyway, it was the white shirt and the black coat I wore on the train and my loafers, because by then I had stopped trying, and my feet hurt. Mmmm, loafers. They’re orthopedic! (I’m eighty.)

So, the only daytime outfit I wore, as far as you know!

I annotated it, since I thought “Everything is grey!” is a lovely statement, which it is…in person. In hotel-room lighting you look like you’re wearing a jumpsuit under your morning coat. (I would NEVER.)

Check out the belt; it’s low-slung so you KNOW it’s steampunk.

Of course, in the evening we cared again, so we got gussied up for the masked ball. Ekaterina looked awesome – she wore a chemise AND bloomers, plainly visible, garnering her many historical-accuracy points. She also had a killer corset and a funky-ass tulle skirt that I hope she wears with tee shirts and tall boots all the time after this, because that thing was rockin’. She also had an antique fan that seemed sweet until you looked closer and realized that it wasn’t a circle of people dancing, it was a circle of people avoiding a blindfolded guy in the center of the circle who was wielding an enormous wooden spoon, trying to HIT PEOPLE WITH IT. Ye Old Whacke-a-Molle, you guys. No joke.

She also had an amazing dragon mask, as you can see in this picture, which also shows her pintucked chemise and the really gorgeous color of her corset.

Meanwhile, I hauled myself into my dress, which worked on a conceptual level and turned out to be absolutely impossible to walk in. Note to self: in future, try that shit out before you take it in public, jeez.

First, a look at the skirt. The idea was to look as if a proper Victorian ball gown had been covered in dust and was slowly starting to come apart. I tell you this because I thikn the concept still works, even if in reality it looks like the Tulle Council sponsored this dress.

Did I mention how hard it was to walk? I don’t know if I did.

There’s just something about a dress that fans out two feet behind you. Every time I turned I had to kick the back of my dress so it wouldn’t attack all the people in a four-foot radius.

In the picture below, you can see that, if anyone had happened to set me on fire, there were two fire doors AND a pitcher of cold water. I was not going to be immolated on THEIR watch, no sir!

This time with handy arrows. I am glad the camera did not catch my expression, which was dangerously close to “the vapors”.

The best and worst thing about tulle is that it obscures detail, so if you made a mistake it’s hard to see, but if you want to point out your $18/yard ruffled cotton, well, you can’t see that either.

And so endeth SalonCon – well, technically it ended with Abney Park playing, but we could hardly see them and some of the dancing started to get really violent (if you have a cane, don’t mosh! This should be common sense! Spinal injuries are not period!) and I feared for my skirt, so I bolted back to the room to put on pajamas. (Though I caught a glimpse of on the dancefloor – girl can dance!)

When I can muster a little more enthusiasm to flip through Flickr I’ll point out my favorite costumes, but we’ll see. It would have been easier to take my own, but I took THREE pictures of other people. (I’m telling you, one picture of your bleached-out bones and that’s it! I am a terrible photoblogger.)