Couple Costume "Pepe Le Pew and Penelope"

This is my first Instructable and I do this with the little "school-english" and hope it's okay for you all. If not feel free to tell me what detail is needed to correct. For better understanding: 10 Zentimeter (cm) = 3,937 Inches, 1 Meter (m) = 1,0936 Yards

In February in Cologne where I live is "Karneval". That's why I designed an Outdoor-Couple-Costume for the Day "Rosenmontag" where thousands of costumed people are at the streets to party and collect sweets and candy.


Things to use:

long-haired fake-fur black (1 to 1,5 Meter) for both Tails and the Skunk-Stripes
long-haired fake-fur white (0,5 to 1 Meter) for the white Skunk-Stripes
short-haired fake-fur black (5 Meter) for both Overalls, the Ears and Hoods
short-haired fake-fur white (1 to 1,5 Meter) for the Bellys, Ears and the Cat-Stripes
foam material (used 3 Plates of 50x80 Zentimeter,  2 cm thick)
Glue for the Foam (maybe some hexagonal Wire as Inlay for more sculpting)
2 Overalls for Painter
2 Papermaché Masks
1 black Clown-Nose of Foam, cutted in halves
Sewing-machine
Scissors,
lots of Needles,
a buddy to help


"Rosenmontag" in Germany the temperature often is "snow-cold" and a "Rosenmontagszug" lasts up to 5 Hours, that's why we used these big overalls, because we have to wear lots of clothes under the costumes).

First we had to decide if the overall needs to be shorter at sleeves or legs.Then we cut apart the overalls because we need the parts to mark the fake-fur. Be sure to use the fur always in the same/right direction: The hair lies in one direction! Lay all parts on your short-hair fur and pin them on. So it's the mark and the lining at same time. We also cut the white parts for the belly out of the overall parts to use them later.
Cut out and sew the overall-parts on the fur. After sewing the Body and the Sleeves we sewed the Zipper we got from the Painter-Overalls. They' match perfect because they're long enough and in white!

Next you have to decide how big the two Tails have to be.
For my 183 Zentimeter tall husband we designed a tail 75 cm long and 11 to 35 cm wide. For me (162  Zentimeter tall) we designed a tail 55 cm long and  11 to 25 cm wide. We also added some hexagonal wire, but I think it's almost the same effect without this. We thought we could add a little bit "modelling" if it's in the middle of the two plates tail. 

The white stripes for the back and the tails we designed 11 cm wide and the small black stripe for the skunk-tail is 3cm wide.
Feel free to decide if that's enough for you, we thought it's perfect for us. (btw: After sewing the Tails to the Overalls we added a long  String in the Middle to fix the Position. And while you walk the Tail has a cute "swing"!)

We also used the hood of the overalls to design the heads. I also wanted to create the Skunkhead with the typical "Pepe-Hair" so that was a little bit tricky. Will show you how I done that with the long white stripe on the back! Cut the End like shown at the Pictures and add a part of long-haired Fur in black: the "great hair effect" is perfect.

Also make sure to design different Ears too, to show that you're different animals ;-) I prefer add a smaller inner-ear to a 1cm bigger outer-ear. After turning inside out it appears with a small black shape at the outer line.

We decided to wear Papermaché-Masks which we layered with a small amount of glue and short-haired fur after we cutted out the perfect eye-shape. With a little rubber band it's easy to use. Paint your Face white for a perfect look! (wish we had done not only around the eyes ;-) ) You can add typical Noses of Foam sculpted with a sharp scissor. I made ours of a black Clown-Nose.

We also sewed two bags with the typical Skunk-Stripes as you can see at the pictures. (For the Candys and Sweets)

Because I had less time I didn't sew Paws for Hands and Feet but we used black Gloves instead.

Now you've finished an easy and quick Outdoor Couple-Costume!