The Licorice Festival

Back in April I had been hired to model two different balloon-dresses at The Swedish Annual Licorice Festival at Münchenbryggeriet i Stockholm, to help promote the work of the amazing Maria "The Balloon-Princess" Byquist! I've been postponing doing a blog post about it because I'm still waiting for the photographer to send me pictures of the second dress. But since it seems they won't come, and I managed to find some photos of it on the net instead, I'll just do this post now anyway!


The evening before the two-day festival begun there was a press showing, and that's when Maria built the first balloon-dress directly on my body.

She uses special latex balloons that holds better than "normal" balloons, so I guess you could say this was the first time I wore a latex dress! I knew from before Maria could create almost anything out of balloons, but I was still astounded at how she just put this dress together, piece, by piece, on me! The bodice is weaved to a perfect fit with long, slim balloons, and inside the transparent balloons she put pieces of licorice, and even whole boxes of candy! For the press showing she wanted me to wear my pointe shoes too, to make me look like a balloon-ballerina!

Here you can see it from the back. The thin "ribbons" tied over my back are also - non inflated - balloons! When the dress was done and I walked out into the show room people gathered around me with their cameras like a pack of hyenas around a dead wilderbeast! And that was just a small preview of how the next two days was going to be...

Photo: Inger Bladh

For the first actual festival day I was able to wear the same dress as the night before. Maria just had to break it a little bit so I could get out of it after the press showing, and then into it the day after, and then mended it to look perfectly new again! The fabulous hat maker Marika Smith came by with a hat she had created for the event - with licorice on it of course!

For the second day Maria really outdid herself by building an even more amazing dress on me! It took two whole hours!

It had a fitted bodice going down into a v in the back, a huge skirt, and epaulettes made out of small licorice bags! 

Source

To this dress she made me a licorice bag with a balloon-handle too. If you wonder how I went to the bathroom during the eight hours the festival went on both days, the answer is; I didn't...I couldn't even sit in those creations. But I kept from eating or drinking as much as I could to prevent ending up in a situation where I actually would have to do something indecent on the floor...

Maria had decorated more than me for the festival, and here you can see some of her other work. I love that little balloon-basket! After these days my cheeks were actually stiff from all the smiling to cameras a had done! I'm not lying when I say I was being photographed constantly during those eight hours a day! I guess girls in balloon-dresses are popular attractions...

Photo: Jinni

Here's me with Maria (on the floor), her fiance Mr Dannyman - who is a magician - and Jinni, holding one of Maria's other balloon-creations! I had two and a half tiering but amazing days, and at the end of the last day I had two persons with big scissors popping me out of that dress!

All photos (unless otherwise stated) by Annelie Elfsö.