When is comes to Disney cosplayers know how to bring it to whole new levels or bring it down a notch with something called DisneyBounding.
DisneyBounding is an alternative form of cosplay in which the participant dresses up as an iconic Disney character in casual contemporary fashion by assembling a color-coordinated outfit that is subtly evocative of the aforementioned character.
Look at it like this DisneyBounding is an alternative to cosplay; cosplay is when you cosplay a character wearing their outfits/hair/makeup to pull off that character’s costume either replicating it exactly or with a twist and variation of your own design. DisneyBounding is when you wear regular day to day clothes that are modelled or themed after Disney characters, inspired looks and outfits.
With DisneyBounding you can wear these outfits everyday. Those who DisneyBound would be able to hide in plain sight, with their clothing deemed to be casual enough to blend in with what everyone else is wearing, subtle enough to pass but bold enough that a keen Disney fan might spot the homage to a specific character.
When did Disney Bounding begin? DisneyBounding is a tough practice to put an exact age on but it would be fair to say that it’s become popular in the last number of years and many attritibute that to DisneyBounder and blogger Leslie Kay of the DisneyBound blog.
As I said above, there are different to degrees DisneyBounding; it can be made to look as obvious as you would like it to be or as subtle as you want, worked and worn for any occasion. Here are two examples that I’ve put together:
Jacket : € 31 Top: € 15 Skirt: € 6.37 Shoes: € 35 Bag: € 49
Lipstick: € 33 Eyeliner: € 6.45 Mascara: € 11
The outfit shown above leaves very little to the imagination when it comes to guessing which character it represents. In case the signature colours were not a dead give away then the apple shaped purse definitely should be.
The red jacket pays omage to inner lining of the cape we see her wearing in the classic Disney movie. The top is cropped to add a modern flair with the length but keeping the traditional signature blue. Snow whites skirt and shoes are a bright yellow to match her regular outfit the cut out details on the shoes makes them perfect in my eyes.
Last but not least the red lipstick. The red tone of this lipstick would brighten up most faces paired with a small cat eye and volumous eyelashes.
Necklace: € 12 Top: € 9.59 Jeans: € 15 Ankle Boots: € 46 Pumps: € 46
Bag: € 37 Eyeshadow: € 6.31 Mascara: € 15 Lipgloss: € 24
On the other hand this outfit is more subtle, it is not as obvious as the Snow White outfit. Instead of going for a skirt I chose to go with black jeans. To symbolize her tentacles, purple shoes for the colour underneath the tentacles, black strapless top to imitate her bodice, a simple gold disk necklace in place of her shell necklace and a turquoise blue bag to pay homage to her similarly coloured companions.
A glossy red lip and vibrant blue shadow pull this look together.
Inspiration can come from the characters themselves or even from other Disney Bounds. Swap and change items to suit your style of dressing. Not sure where to start ? There are plenty of sources out there!
With multitudes of characters to chose from and varying degrees of inspiration in mind there is the potential of hundreds of DisneyBound outfits waiting to be worn.
All in all I feel that DisneyBounding is going to become more popular world wide with meet ups being organised, blogs and instagram hashtags dedicated to the practice.
Who would you DisneyBound?
