Second Hand Rose

This is what I like to think of as a found or remade hat. I found the basic hat for $2 or $3 dollars at a thrift store. It's got a 30's feel, but I think it's actually a 60's hat. It had a brown bow on it which I removed and made the silk ribbon roses. I make the roses a little differently with a double twist to mix the colors and create petals. I don't wear it very often because I don't wear much brown, but I really like how it turned out.

Oops, already missed a day. Thought of it often, but didn't have pictures with me. Remembered as I was getting into bed. Sent photo to myself at work. Will have to do another tonight.

This is another from "Far Away." It's a bowler hat with a plastic plant on top of it. It was a little difficult to wear simply because the plant was heavy and would list to one side or the other. It's called "Rene" after Rene Magritte. It lives on a bookshelf in my bedroom, and casts creepy shadows on the walls.

I designed the hats for "Far Away" in three ways. Some I actually thought of--i.e. designed, "I'd like to make a hat that looks like this," and found the pieces I needed. This was one of those. I just saw this in my head, the plant on the bowler.

After I'd designed several like that I went shopping. I walked through Home Depot, dollar stores, toy stores, craft stores, and simply bought things that struck me as interesting. Some things suggested hats when I saw them--the silver vent tubing of "Sultan Blue" for instance, and some I just brought home and started playing.

Renaissance Mosaic with Feather

This is the basic hat I've made and sold (this is the one I mailed to a certain J-Pop star). I bought one like it, lost it, and thought, "Hey, I could make that." I almost always do it in velvet, lined in a contrasting silk shantung. It just feels more like the Renaissance that way. I've tried different embellishments, and if I sold it again, I'd probably try fancier ones. The feather annoys people on the train, but it certainly gets you attention.

Sultan Blue

I love hats and a few years ago I campaigned to be the designer on a local production of Caryl Churchill's "Far Away," a play that calls for at least 50 hats. I've also made more traditional hats to sell.

I've named every hat I've made (just as old artisans used to name everything). For some reason that delighted the lighting designer.

This one is called Sultan Blue. It's vent tubing on a cloche hat base with an electric blue feather boa. It was quite large, but very wearable because of the hat base. I kept several hats from the show--as many as I felt I could store, but for some reason I didn't keep this one and I've regretted it ever since. One of the dressers on the show took it, but I suspect when she moved she couldn't have kept all of the hats she took.

It's called Sultan Blue because it reminds me of a Sultan's turban as done by Hollywood--think "Kismet" or "Arabian Nights," not reality. There's a great book called "Hollywood and History" that discusses how Hollywood is never accurate, but ever after reality looks disappointing after Hollywood glam.