And then, there was a hat!

The Scarlet Witch Steampunk ensemble work continues, and I have finally gotten around to constructing the hat.  If you pay a visit to my friend's blog, Ribbons and Riesling, you'll see how a hat is actually built from the ground up.  I am a cheater pants, though.

I cheat at Monopoly, cards, and sewing whenever possible, so to make this hat, I started with a hat - A cheap black costume top hat, and I just started covering it with fabric.  Step one was sewing a cylinder to cover the hat.

I hand stitched the fabric close and tight as I could around the hat, but it wasn't tight enough...so then the serious cheating began.  I plugged in the hot glue gun.

While it was heating up, I pleated a length of the fabric to use to cover the brim.

Then I hot glued it to the inside of the hat.

So, then it looked like a hat with a fashionable skirt attached.

Then I folded over the hat skirt and glued it down to cover the brim.  It made a little pleated-like effect with which I was fairly pleased.

The I stitched up a hat band out of the same fabric, and glued it down (a section at a time) all the way around the hat - pulling it tight and pinning it after each section.  When the glue set up, I took out the pins and started work on the embellishments.

This is a picture of Marvel's Scarlet Witch.  As you can see, the headpiece frames the face and it pointed at the tops over the eyes.  My task was to translate this to a Victorian-esque hat that will echo that shape.  Red top hat...so what has two points at the tops and is hopelessly Victorian?  Big freaking Ribbon bows!

Not quite as pointy as I wanted, but I can work with this.  I wired the ribbon myself, so I could shape it easily.

I had to have some veiling, too.  Because I like flounce and fluff.  That's Hansel, my wig-head in the picture.  Hansel?  Hansel?

Once the bows were shaped a bit better and pinned, I think it gives the effect I need to resemble the shape of Scarlet Witch's headpiece.

And because I can, here's an early illustration of Scarlet Witch.  Her mask completely frames her face, but I didn't want to use that look as it reminded me too much of...

...this.

Traya Progress, a pictorial...

Not any text, here. I'm just uploading the photos so I can link them for critique. ;-)

Avengers! Continue to assemble...all the stuff you're making.

Work continues on the "Steampunk" Scarlet Witch!  I finished the skirt, and it was too big in the waist.  Either my measurements have changed since a month or so ago, or I stitched it together wrong, or what have you.  It's too big, though.  I choose to shed no tears and solve it with a clip to cinch it up.

So, let's take a look at the replay...

I stitched together the lining for the bustier, just to take a look at the fit on my dress dummy.  If the skirt turned out too big, even going by my most recent set of measurements, I wanted to make certain a piece like the bustier was altered to fit as close as possible.

Sure enough, there was way more overlap than there should have been.  Plan A?  Continue and pretend like this is not an issue until we get to the zipper.  This was a decent plan.

The main fabric and interfacing together, here.  Seams pressed and getting ready to add the boning.  Note:  I despise pressing curved seams flat.

The boning was just a pre-fab feather-weight with it's own sleeve.

I had to measure, cut, then remove the boning to leave just the sleeve, then stitch the sleeve down, centering it on the seams of the bodice.  Not difficult, but tedious and slow going, as I didn't want to end up with wavy seams.

Done and trying it on the dress dummy!  It fit!  I ended up taking about an extra 1.5 inches off each side of the back so I could lose the extra fabric.  I just lack the handwork and buttons on this piece!

So far, so good.  It's coming together, and I'm not quite as panicked about the amount of costume work I still have left to do.  It's going pretty quickly!

So many projects, so little time

So, here we are, well into August, with the start of school around the corner, and about four weeks left in the first of many costuming deadlines.  Today, I spazzed out for about 30 minutes, then I buckled down and started sewing, painting, and such until just a little while ago, when I wrapped up my day with leatherwork with the help of a friend.

First up today was the skirt from this pattern.  It's Simplicity 2172, but don't let the name fool you.  Their actual idea of "simplicity" involves thirty bajillion small pieces, and some require you "cut 9".   /headdesk

I'm making it out of this lovely, shockingly red fabric.  It will be a Steampunk version of the Scarlet Witch (One of Marvel's Avengers).  This large mishappen pile is actually the body of the skirt.

This pile?  This is the "9" pieces sewn together which I then had to pleat.  Yes, pleat, before I attached them to the bottom of the skirt.

See! Pleating like a boss.  This pattern also involved a yoke, waistband and a zipper (my first foray into zipper sewing).  "Did you insert the zipper correctly?", you may ask.  I would reply with, "Do I look like I care?" At which point you would look at the crazy in my eyes and back away slowly.

We also worked on the Darth Traya headpiece this evening.  That's Hansel, in the picture, modelling it for you.  Hansel?  Hansel.

This piece is almost finished.  I put the red trimming around the openings in the leather, and affixed a cabochon to the center above the point.  I now have to attach a small wimple and the wig to the whole thing to make one piece.

Lastly, I put a couple coats of paint on the mask that will serve as part of my husband's costume, a Steampunk interpretation of The Vision (also Marvel's Avengers).  This will be cool when I'm done with it.  But it's just kind of along for the ride, today.

Me, wigged out after a long day of costuming work.