Author: ragmin

Hat blocks were made over centurys in Europe. Most of them from wood, but alternative materials like wire, stiffed fabric, paper maché, plaster or different kinds of mass were also used.

Industrial production of hat blocks came with the 19th century. But the handmade, unique  blocks, build by wood-carvers or women still existed. And they looked often very different to the industrial ones.

Industrial blocks have holes on the underside, to put them on a stand for work, but some of the unique hand-made blocks have none.  And it was (and still IS) common, to use laminated wood for a hat block.  Usually hardwood was used, but there are some examples of different kinds of woods, especially on unique hand made blocks.

Huge and heavy hat blocks, that would have tipped a stand over, got supporters of wood underneath or were plain.

And it was not always necesssary to use needles and pins. Until the early 20th century, the hat crown was fixed on the pass to the brim with belt-like stripes of leather or strings. Felt- or straw bodies were just folded under the underside of that huge and heavy hat blocks. And also grooves, very common today, existed then. Little cushions, filled with sand or rice, held the hat body down on cavitys.

Some of this methods are still commonly today!

OK, Lady….But  WHAT is the meaning of this lecture?

Wait and see! Here comes the story of the “rage-hat”:

Some years ago, by asccident, I found a vintage hat block from around 1910-18 with one of those outsized hat-crowns, that were fashionable at the time. I dreamed of making period hats for theaters or reenactment, but it never turned out this way. So I sold the hat block with a heavy heart for a good price.

Problem solved and everything´s coming up roses?

No! The opposite! Soon after, I received a rather “frosty”email from the buyer.

She told me, I had sold her a useless “decoration item” instead of a genuine hat block and wanted her money back.

Her reasons were: The hat block has no holes on the underside and can not be used on a stand, it is laminated from different pieces of wood and those “shelfes” are not suitable to push pins in.

That´s right. But the heavy hat block was never meant to be worked on a stand. It´s weight is 3 kg! And it´s not necessary to work with pins on it. The use of  laminated “shelfes” is also not uncommon. And why on earth, should anyone with a sense make a huge block in shape of a Titanic-Era hat and use it as a decoration item at home?

I must confess, it made me angry. A good milliner should have the skills to work even on uncommon hat blocks and not only on convenient modern or industrial pieces!  It´s ok, to “dump” some technics or blocks, if you don´t go along with it, or you found a better way.  but it´s important, to test it and have the experience!

I payed the money back and the hat block came back home again. I think, I keep it!

But there are things, I won´t have!  And one of them is, if someone accuses me, I had sold her decoration-rubbish, useless for millinery.

So I sat down and MADE a hat with this block! Without using pins! (I should have done that years before!)

And here it is, the hat, that can´t exist, according to this Lady….Rather nice for a hat, made on a “decoration item”, isn´t it ?

 

Ok…Another cloche again….!

But I love them! And this one got a special embellishment: A big Art Nouveau dragonfly in the middle of the front and eight swarming little brass-lizards  from the same era on one side.  The hat is Art Déco-Style, but I think, the metal stamp-animals are a good match anyway. But there are people, who get a bit edgy, by the sight of this hat…..

It´s fun to have some beautiful wooden hat blocks….But what, if you can´t get the one you desire for a new project, because there is no hat block in the right shape on the market or you simply have not enough money to buy , or let it custom-made for you?

Or you had just started millinery and your budget is very small?

So be creative!

Look everywhere: In your kitchen, your cabinets, on flea-markets, sozial-departments….But for WHAT? Hat blocks seem to appear there seldom…REAL hat block off course…But some items in the form of hats and fascinators are easy to find.

Bowls  in every shape and size, candlesticks, lampshades, sieves, lids, coasters…Whatever inspires you, can be used for millinery.

But what about items, made of glass, ceramic or metal? It´s impossible, to push the millinery-pins in.

I have solved the problem by wrapping some strong gaffer-tape around the edge of the item, I want to use. Usually I  avoid the use of anything plastic, but in this case, I couldn´t find another solution. (And as you can see on the pictures, there IS a blue plastic-bowl! But I simply couldn´t resist the curvy shape!)

The gaffer-tape sticks on the edge in- and outside and you can plunge the pins careful through, if you stretch the hat body.

So don´t let your small budget get in the way of your millinery. There is always a possibility and to use “lost” items like shabby bowls, lids without their pots, shades of broken lamps and ugly candlesticks as millinery items , can be another wise way of “recycling”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another rag-princess-tale.

“Look, what I made!” the rag-princess yelled.

Prince charming startlet that much, he almost fell off the chair.  “Wife! Why are you screaming like a sirene? Ist the enemy on our gate, ready to attack the castle?”

“No, silly!  Of course not! I just wanted to show you the new cloche-hat, I recyled from an old one!”

“Another hat?” prince charming groaned. “When I opened your closet last week almost 500 of them fell out!”

“342 including this one, to be precise…They are part of my project “365 hats around the year.” That means, there are still 23 to make! Now tell me…do you like it?”

“I find it hideous! prince charming said. “There are two things, I really dislike and those are cloches and velvet of every kind!”

“But I love cloches and velvet!” The rag-princess beeped.

“As if I didn´t know!” prince charming snapped.

“Do you like ANY of my hats?”

“…Well….Some of your cart-wheels aren´t that bad….But the others are quite absurd. I wished, you would wear the crown instead, I gave you for our wedding.”

“The crown is pressing. It gives me a headache. And It´s not very helpful in the rain or burning sun!”The rag-princess said and straightened her cloche, that was displaced while the crosstalk.

“But you would much more look like a princess and not like a….a….There is acctually no word for it! And everyone in the fairy-land knows, that princesses never get wet in the rain or even get a sunburn!”

“Rubbish! What about Cinderella? When I saw her two days ago, she was wet like a rat for beeing caught in the rain without a hat or umbrella!”

the rag-princess gave her husband a scathing look,  floated to the cloak room to get her coat and soon after, when both went for a walk, she wore her new cloche and a velvet coat……

The red cloche on the pictures is recycling. When I started millinery years ago, some of my beginners-hats were actual catastrophes. This one was so horrible, I burried it as deep as I could in my “trunk of shame”. But that was no real solution, so I digged it out again and turned it into this cloche. It has some little flaws on the inside, but on the outside it looks brand- new. I embellished the hat with silk-satin-ribbon, vintage petersham ribbon and a genuine art-déco-belt buckle.

First Version

 Final Version

 

Series 3 of “Miss Fishers Murder Mysteries” finally arrived here on the  day before Christmas. And -as expected- some fantastic new hats did show up.

When I saw the  pink toque with the vintage embroidered flower embellishment, I got “voracious” to have one in that style for my own….

Of course not exactly the same hat.  The dark pink of the original hat does absolutly nothing for me. So I chose eggplant colored felt from a hat, I made years ago and now wanted to recycle.

And I wanted to try a beautiful old french hat block, I possess for years and never did anything with. It has a slightly different shape, but I wanted it that way.

About the vintage flower-decoration, I can say , that for once I was in a good position: I didn´t have to look far, because some of those embroidered flowers were produced in the eastern part of Germany, between the 1920s-40s.

And many of them were hidden and forgotten for a long time in old stores, cellars, attics and storerooms, survived the times of the DDR and now come back to light again one after the other.

By chance I found one, matching my hat and very similar in color to the one on the pink toque. It has of course a complete different shape. To get exactly the same flower would have been a miracle and much more, than I expected.

But mine ist pretty too and I mounted it on the felt bow, belonging to the hat.

After finishing, I made pictures and found the hat pretty well on my “assistent” Lucy. But when I tried, it looked somehow odd.

DARN!

I turned the hat from left to right, put it on askew and finally turned it completely with the back in front….That´s when I found out, what was wrong: The flower-bow-decoration was on the same side like the pink toque showed. But my Version looked much better on ME with the bow on the opposite. So I removed the bow, turned it upside down and remounted the flower. Than I sewed it on the other side.

And now it works. I made new pictures with Lucy, put it on myself and it really looks much better!

The first comment I got, after finishing this hat was “My grandmother had some like these….”

I answered ” But mine is DIY and there is only one.”

“Well….I hope so!”