Even more hat making!

The Jagermonster outfits continue. There will be hats! I've got two of the three hats for the family finished now. Basic construction involved buckram and wire. I started with a hat for the munchkin first.



The basic framework, with wires to support the sided. I then padded it with batting. The munchkin picked out her own fabrics, and picked this tapestry sample as the lining:



Keeping this form in the back of my head for future reference, as it'd make a pretty cool crown.

Put the top on and it's starting to look a bit like a demented bishop's mitre:



And the finished piece:



Still looking for something to tack on to the center of the top, as it's a bit bare.

The hat concept I'd initially developed for my husband was something along the lines of a mad hatter tophat, but when I initially sewed the pattern pieces together for his hat, I really liked the boxy shape with the seams on the outside:



Again, hoarding remnants comes in handy. He picked a bronze and black brocade and a milk chocolate brown corduroy for his hat:



The buttons are antique brass military pieces that I found at a thrift store at Pike Place Market a couple of months ago.

One more hat and a jacket to go. Dere vill be jagers here, ya!

The making of a black and white plaid hat

I realized I'd never posted about this - back in January I attended a Steampunk Exhibition Ball at the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle. Part of the evening's festivities were fabulous hat and facial hair competitions. I decided I was going to make myself a new hat for the occasion. My wonderful friend Stephanie, who appropriately travels under the name Plaidbrat on LiveJournal was bravely tackling a dress-making project for me, with this wonderful black and white plaid I'd unearthed from the stash early last year. It had a velvet floral scrollwork pattern on one side. She did the jacket for me with this pattern out, but we decided it'd be just too busy for the whole outfit, so the plain plaid side is out for the skirt.

I didn't take enough pictures of the making in progress, I'm afraid, so bear with me.

For the hat, I wanted big. Really big. And I had these six fake crows that had been sitting around on top of my bits and bobs cabinet, staring at me accusingly for not having used them yet.

I started out using household items for my pattern, a ceramic serving dish for the brim and one of our salad plates for the crown.



I added another 3" around tracing the platter for the sides and back, and about 5" in the front. It's amazing, because I fail consistently trying to draw a straight line with a ruler, but managed to freehand an almost perfectly symmetrical oval. ???

The brim is made with two layers of buckram sandwiching a spiral of millinary wire, glued into place. I covered the entire hat, inside and out, with felt, and then covered it with the fabric. Then out came the flowers, birds, feathers, and maribou trim. Here's what I ended up with:





A friend of mine swore that the birds were staring at her whenever we talked.





And here's the whole outfit:

A Year in the Making, day 296

It's been a busy weekend - I had two social events on Friday, a promo photoshoot for Steamcon and a movie viewing party on Saturday, and today was Pride Parade!

For one of Friday's gatherings I made what I call my Lemon Dream Cake:



It's always a favorite.

I finished the dress for the parade Friday night, and made a hat from scratch to match. I've made one other hat from scratch, but that was with a pattern. This time I completely winged it, with the aid of a pre-made piece I picked up ages ago at Display and Costume. I still had buckram left over from my previous project, and used scraps from the dress-making for the fabric.

I started off using a hat I reworked for my daughter for the basic shape:



I did a double thickness for the brim, for stiffness:



Traced out the crown for the opening on the brim pieces:



Cut out the circle for the crown and tabbed it:



Traced out the top of the crown - the outer border is the seam allowance. Neglected to take a picture, but this piece was tabbed too after I cut it out.



The assembled buckram framework:



The line you see around the brim is aluminum wire tacked on for stiffness, to keep the shape of the brim.



Here's the underside:



The fabric was tabbed also, and sewn on:





I made a band of the contrast fabric from the gown for around the crown:



Here's where I stopped taking pictures because I was running out of time. Some black cotton was used for lining, and the edges finished around the inside of the crown and around the rim of the brim with black bias tape, and then I finished it with daisy gimp:





And here's a shot of me in the dress and hat, and the necklace which inspired the gown, from today's Pride Parade in downtown Seattle - unfortunately I blinked.