So another week begins and so does another new piece. With Pensacola Paracon just finishing I thought it would be fun to do the reveal on a project that I have been working on for a while now. As mentioned in a few earlier blogs I have played with decorating hats before.
Well this time around I decided to see if I could make a hat from scratch. Now sewing wise I am quite limited. I don’t own a sewing machine nor do I know how to use one (of which I plan on correcting soon. ) This limits me to hand sewing which I'm not bad at but not too good for big projects. So this time around I decided to give my wirewrapping skills a test and Tadahh: Wire Hat!
The base of the hat is a thicker industrial wire that was leftover from my weeping angel costume from last year. I formed this into the base of the hat. The thicker wire I could only get to wrap so much to the base was a bit shaky. I remedied this by using thinner wire to enforce the shape. I knew I would need a LOT of this thinner wire for what I had planned so instead of getting, crafting wire I got a spool of gardening wire. I wound this around the wire base two times to make the wire a bit more firm.
After that I got to work on the brim of the hat. This was the most time consuming part. I would have to twist two pieces together. This took the longest and I often just took the wire with me. (I have since learned the drill trick which will be good for later projects) I would then fasten the wire into half of a heart with a bit of a swirl at the end and attach it to the brim. I then mirrored the action on the other side of this and attached the middle of the two hearts together.
I did this all around the brim. I then added a drop of solder to the edge of each heart to keep any pieces from scratching or snagging on anything it. Once the brim was finished I began work on the sides. I played around with a few different ideas. I originally thought of doing lots and lots of swirls, a crisscross pattern, I even played around with making giant hearts to match the brim. Finally I settled on a mixed pattern with twirls. I then added the gears and assorted beads to the mix and attached them via chain.
Finally I took some of the extra pieces of ribbon from my ribbon box and laced it around the top and the bottom of the hat to both add a final touch and to give it a bit of cushioning.
And Tah Dah! Wire hat!
The entire project took about a month to two weeks. (I’m afraid I can’t give a specific time as I moved while in the middle of working on this and had to shelve it for a bit.) I enjoyed the final result so much that I ended up making a full costume for it which I debuted at Paracon.
I got so many compliments on the hat an even may have a few commissions for them. I may do a few more of these in the future but for now I am off to the next bit project. Airship!
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