"A
hat is a flag, a shield, a bit of armor, and the badge of femininity. A
hat is the difference between wearing clothes and wearing a costume; it's
the difference between being dressed and being dressed up; it's the
difference between looking adequate and looking your best. A hat is to be
stylish in, to glow under, to flirt beneath, to make all others seem
jealous over, and to make all men feel masculine about. A piece of magic
is a hat."
~ Martha
Sliter
In good old Victorian times a lady out-of-doors without her hat was either scandalous or in dire need. Women paid as much attention to their hats as to the entire rest of their outfit and to go without a head covering of at least some sort was unthinkable. Now days we pay more attention to our hair and our makeup than to what goes on top of it all. (Makeup by the way in early victorian & edwardian days was only ever worn by actresses and harlots... powder being the only acceptable deviation from this rule)
So hats are almost a prerequisite to steampunk fashion. ^___^
Sidenote: Please forgive the rabbit hair everywhere. You don't know shedding till you've seen a jersey wooly rabbit during the spring molt. ;>.>
I came across this lovely felt hat on a clearance shelf, and couldn't resist the challenge. After all if I totally fail this it's only $2 to cry about.
It is made from FELT (so at least somewhat period correct already). It's simple. It's nice and neutral colored. There are just two things wrong with this hat. 1. The brim is lacking anything to help it hold it's shape.
2. The crown is WAY too tall/deep. It fits perfectly if I wanted to wear it with my hair down/braided, etc. But since I plan to wear it with a nice chignon (an elaborate hair bun/knot worn at the nape of the neck) it will need some reworking in order to sit properly on top of the head/hair. So we're going to turn this into a nice 'boater' style hat to fit better with an Edwardian themed costume.
Step one is to take off the excess height. Because we want to do as little cutting/reworking as possible this has to be done CAREFULLY. I happened to have a nice old helix angle/circle maker that was the perfect fit. A lid or bowl might have done the trick too. When pressed in to the appropriate height it made it easy to chalk out the cutting line.Next a sharp box cutter & some good quality fabric shears made swift work of that unwanted height.
Down to business. Being felt we have a lovely advantage here - A good quick soak in some warm water, a hot steaming with an iron, and a day or so of pressing between dry towels and heavy objects, and we suddenly get the new top for the hat, all perfect and flat and round as it if were made for the thing. (Which, of course, it is.)
Next I worked out the brim issue. Some double fold bias tape leftover from corset making provided just the
casing needed. (turned the hat inside out and machine stitched the underside) I didn't have any milliner's wire so instead we're using a couple twisted strands of full hard jewelry wire to stiffen the brim and give us an edge we can use to reshape the hat. (A little florists tape also bound the edges so they won't
risk poking through later on.)
Now comes the fun part involving tedious amounts of hand sewing. <3(I think I'll post another blog soon regarding the glorious Thimble and it's essential nature to sewing. Rule #1 if you are like me: Do not sew by hand without one.)
Remember - small even stitches. This WILL show along the top of the brim, so take it slow and make sure your needle is in the right spot before you draw it through or you'll be stuck with a messy edge.
Top gets re-fitted in place (the hat at this point is still being worked inside out) and held with clips instead of pins so I can get right to the edge. I could have machine stitched this first, but I wasn't to be sure I didn't end up with bunching or gaps so hand sewing here too. (I LOVE these little red clips btw. They are nice and small but have an amazingly strong grip. They were gifted me by my awesome friend Drakokatze who got them from Hancock Fabrics, and I now use them in practically everything. Thank you! )
For added neatness & to help secure the edge I then machine stitched on some twill tape to cover the seam (and make the exterior stitches look nicer). This is not an essential step but I did it anyway because I love to over-complicate things for the sake of it.
Fini!
(Turned right side out and with the edges pressed into shape.)
Now just trim & enjoy!
#steampunk #victorian hats #rabbitfureverywhere
