DIY Ruth Bader Ginsburg Dog Costume

Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s dissent collar is an instantly recognizable icon of women’s rights and the trailblazing woman who worked so hard to secure them. In honor of her legendary life, I wanted to create a DIY Dissent Collar for Halloween this year. Once the collar was crated I couldn’t resist fashioning a full costume for my sweet girl Wrigley. Read on below for my DIY Ruth Bader Ginsburg Dog Costume, no sewing involved!

Note: This tutorial will focus on the costume I made for my dog, but the collar turned out so nice my daughter wants to wear it! And you know what, it fits her too. If you want to dress up as the Notorious RBG this tutorial will also work for people.

This post contains affiliate links– thank you for supporting us.

Craft Supplies

Michael’s:
– One 9 x 12 inch sheet of black felt for the collar
– One 12 x 18 inch sheet for the cape.
Amazon:
– Self-Adhesive Rhinestone Stickers
– Gold Cording
– Black Pipe Cleaners

RGB DIY Dissent Collar

I hand-drew a template on paper to trace for the main collar shape. It turned out so well that I created a graphic version of my template to share with you! See below. Save the image to your desktop and then print it for your own costume. You may need to resize before printing depending on the size of your dog!

Dissent Collar Template

Once I cut the collar shape out of felt, I added adhesive rhinestones to each of the vertical sections. The rhinestones I used are similar to these: Self-Adhesive Rhinestone Sticker

I started at the bottom by adding one rhinestone to the lowest sections (the ones that stick out a little lower than the others). I then went up from there adding more stones in a straight line up to the neckline. After that, I added a horizontal row along the neckline. Reference the photo below for rhinestone placement, you will see that some are larger than others.

After the rhinestones were completed, I cut out two strips of felt for the necktie. These you will need to size to your dog. Finally, I used hot glue to secure the strips to the top of the collar. You can add Velcro or a snap on the ends for a smoother look.

As you can see my dog looks utterly thrilled to be trying on her new RBG collar 😂. She looks adorable, but something was missing so I decided to add gold cording between the rows of rhinestones.

The cording I used was actually up-cycled from the handles of a gift bag. You can find similar cording here: Metallic Tinsel Cord Rope

I cut strips and hot glued them between the rows of rhinestones, around the edges and along the neckline. And voila, a totally beautiful collar worthy of an American icon. It’s a little fancy for a dog, but it can be used on humans too!

*Tip: If you have trouble with removing any hot glue from the black felt you can color it in with a black sharpie to make it less noticeable.

DIY Halloween Dog Glasses

For the glasses, I made a simple pair from pipe cleaners. My dog did NOT like them, but was such a good sport wearing them for the pictures. You can use any glasses without lenses you may have as well.

DIY Dog Robe

To make the robe I used the same technique as my Harry Potter Dog Costume Robe, just without the white shirt collar. See it here: DIY No-Sew Harry Potter Dog Costume! It is basically a rectangle of black felt wrapped around my dog and glued together at her chest area. This way it can just slip over her head and I don’t have to worry about it falling off and it doesn’t restrict her movement.