Photo by Paul Bird
To start with please tell the readers a little about your background.
I’m a university student studying Contemporary Dance at Laban in London. I am also fully bread Yorshire, so as crass as brass and a passionate geek in all forms of the culture!
How long have you been cosplaying? Which costume was your first?
It’s been two and a half years now though it doesn’t seem that long. I started off with a cowless classic Harley Quinn at MCM Expo May 2011 and met up with a load of Harley fans at the UK’s Harleypoolza meet. It was a hell of a lot of crazy and I was hooked instantly!
Nigel Boulton
Who’s your favourite character to cosplay?
Harley Quinn definitely. She is just so much fun, I can go ape shit with her it’s amazing, I don’t have to try and be sexy, pretty or anything but let out a little shit to mess things up. It’s quite cathartic!
Do you make your own costumes?
Some I do, some are commissioned, I’m just really learning the ropes at the mo with actually making stuff. The more complicated costumes Harley and Robin have been commissioned, Robin was done by one of my best friends Holly Rose (Lil Prince Costumes) who is a fantastic costumer and cosplayer. The simplier ones such as Buffy and Ariel are more my work. I’m really focusing on trying to make my cosplays more my work, I want to broaden my skills.
Is there anybody you would like to cosplay that you haven’t or can’t?
Photo by Nick Acott
Bender from Futurama, he’d just be so fun to do, I’ll have an excuse to call everyone a jackass!! Not that that stops me anyway but at the mo I have no idea how to make it and it may be way too much to commission same with the Yellow Ranger which I am desperate to do. I’ve also got to get back to making Spoiler, one of my fave heroes, I just need to resource the correct fabric first before I can move on.
Have any of your cosplays ever gone wrong?
Whilst wearing them? Nothing major luckily, but the first time I wore my comissioned Harley with cowl and mask I had issues glueing the mask to my face. Because of my thick clown make up, the general spirit gum wouldn’t get it to stick kept falling off and messing up my make up. In the end, we got it to stay loosely which was lucky but afterwards I had to invest in spirit gum which worked with my clown make up. I suggest any Harley to use Mehron!
Have you been to many conventions?
I’ve clocked up quite a few come to think about it! All crammed into a short amount of time, I don’t socialise much, the cons tend to be the only time I do, it’s the only time I’ve felt I really belonged to a group of people so I tend to go as much as I can afford to.
Photo by Jamie Brown
What video game cosplays have you done?
I have done two now, Cammy from Street Fighter and Laverne from Day of the Tentacle, I chose them both for my love of the characters and retro gaming. Cammy turned out to be one of my most popular cosplays which I didn’t expect.
What video games are you playing at the moment?
I always have a Pokemon game going on, it’s just a good one to turn on to keep myself busy when I can’t concentrate. I keep picking up my megadrive, at the mo mostly playing Street Fighter 2, Power Rangers the Movie and Bomberman. I’ve been itching to replay Monkey Island 3 for ages but still need to try and get it running on my crappy windows 8, I know there is a site which shows you how much I’m a bit slow!!
How long have you been into games? What’s your first gaming memory?
Photo by Jamie Brown
I grew up with two older bros and we were the generation which were really the first to have games and consoles at our disposal. Our house was a Sega house though now my bro has been wanting a NES. I mostly played on my bros stuff, never really having my own games thingy until I was 12 when I was bought a Game Boy Colour which I still have of course. Saying that the Game Gear was a family thing but mostly was mine, I remember loving the Little Mermaid game on that! Have no clue where that handheld disappeared to, gutted!
Do you play many “retro” games?
I’m more of a retro gamer than anything, faves prob Sam and Max: Hit the Road, the first 3 Monkey Islands and Day of the Tentacle, I’m a real retro LucasArts fan. I loved Westwoods (is that the company?) Hand of Fate. Cos I love these games so much I really want to get my hands on DeathSpank by Ron Gilbert that looks fantastic! And I have Grim Fandango to play but again, I need to try and get it working on my Windows 8 (and find time!!)
What’s the most frustrating game you’ve played that’s had you stuck for hours?
I’m an Adventure gamer – EVERY GOD DAMN GAME.
Photo by Sonesh Joshi
Do you like playing online or just play for the story?
Story mostly, none of the things I’ve really played so far needs you to go online.
What game are you most excited about coming out in the near future?
Coming out? Nothing too much as I think my genre of gaming is mostly dead sadly. I would love to finally play the Batman games but I don’t think they work too well on PC.
Thankyou for taking the time to answer our questions, is there anything else you’d like to say to our readers before we finish?
I have a craving for BN biscuits.
If you’d like to see some more cosplays from Kerraldine Holland, you can do so at her facebook page below.