Character: Koto
Series: Yu Yu Hakusho
Total Construction Time: 3 days
Debut: Phoenix Comic Con 2014
Personal Thoughts: I got the idea to make one comfortable cosplay per year that I could fall back on at cons. Something that was simple, easy to get into and I could just take a lazy day if needed. I figured Koto to be my first choice since her outfit, although weird, is simple, very 90’s and I already had most of the material on hand. I also really wanted to cosplay something from YYH as it was the first ‘adult’ anime I had seen when I was 14 outside of Yu-Gi-Oh! and Pokemon. Hearing Yusuke say ‘I’m going to kick your ass‘ on Adult Swim made me feel like it I wasn’t supposed to watch but I did so anyway. It was the first anime outside of kid stuff that really pulled me into the genre further.

Details
This costume was pretty cut and dry. I quickly made the top (which wasn’t all that great), the fake tie, wrist bands and neck piece then focused my attention on the shorts. For some reason, I wanted the shorts to look incredible. I have no idea why. I used an easy pattern and once that was done, I created the tail flap. I used a baby blue lining to give the flap a bit of depth and attached snaps to the shorts and top of the flap so that it could be easily removed for washing.  The tail was from my very first Anime Expo (2005!) which happened to be almost the same color as Kotos tail.  The ears were a gift from a friend back when I was 17. I got some fake white fur that I had lying around, colored it orange and hand sewed it onto the ears since I didn’t want to destroy the grey coloring on the ears.

The best part was honestly going to Goodwill and finding an old Karaoke Revolution mic for the xBox for $6 on the first try!