Making hats for ballet

Just this week I made a hat for a dancer sight unseen.  When making a headpiece or any costume item choosing the right materials and colors is very important. The hat I was making was going to be brown with cranberry colored flowers. Sounds easy, no? but what is cranberry or even brown for that matter? Here is just a small example of shades of cranberry:

 If we are really honest though, color choices are much more like this; just look at the bottom row for "brown":

Since I did not have any fabric swatches I just guessed and made what I thought looked good; a bit risky but I figured if it looked pretty and had several shades, even if it wasn't a perfect match it would still look good. A good way to help with choosing colors and being on the same page when it comes to talking about colors  is to go to the paint store and select some of those chips.
Due to time constraints I had to go with what I had available so I dug into my stash and found some lovely velvets and some lilac and "cranberry" red silk. The dancer and I decided on the brown velvet for the hat base and then I came up with the idea to take silk organza and dye it several shades of "cranberry".

Fabrics from stash

 The next challenge for a ballet hat was its design.

Brown velvet, wired buckram shape and cranberry silk organza for the flowers.

No one wants a hat to fall off but on a dancer staying on your head is a minimal requirement not just "would be nice". A ballet hat has to be fairly strong too. A while back I purchased an e-book from Prudence millenry to help me learn how to make couture flowers and headbands. Using the methods describe there I made a frame of wire and buckram, covered it with some flannel and then applied the velvet. The book called for ice-wool, a short of wool knit batting but that is very hard to find and expensive so I substituted flannel as the flalene. I then dyed horsehair (a nylon, millenry mesh braid which is very strong but will blend into the dancers hair) and some mesh elastic and sewed that onto the bottom of the hat.
The flowers were made by hand, using bias cut tubing and hand cut petals. I also made some Yo-yo style daisies and sewed glass beads into the center to simulate stamens.
Although there are specialize sewing machines to sew hats, you can use a regular machine, I ended up sewing everything by hand to get the tight, clean finish I wanted. The book also shows that to get the best results, the hat shape should be hand sewn.

Hat after blocking

I then blocked and shaped the hat form. To do this I pinned the shape to a foam head and using steam, which softened the glue in the buckram, I reshaped it. Once the hat cools down, the buckram stiffens up again so that the hat keeps it shape. The horsehair on the bottom of the hat and the mesh elastic strap (which runs along the back of the head at the base of the skull) allows the hat to be pinned all around so it will not come off.

Close up of the flowers and hat.

I was happy with the completed hat and after testing it (sounds silly but I feel an once of prevention is worth it), it was packed up and sent off. Another busy week but certainly not dull!

Odette, Odile and Diana: more tiaras, crowns and headpieces

Gold lace and Swarovski hot fix crystal headpiece in Tanzanite and pinks.

The last few weeks have been so much fun for me with designing and making more ballet headpieces. I continued to work on the headpieces I had been making and finished both the gold and fuschia princess ones and the silver Diana one.

Silver Diana headpiece with large crystals AB and Swarovski ligh sapphire stones

Then I received an order for an Odette (white swan queen) headpiece from a dancer in California, so I finally had enough in the kitty to purchase supplies. When the packages arrived from the whole salers it was just like Christmas: all those gorgeous sparkly stones, real Swarovski teardrops, briolets and several gross vintage Precosia rosee montese and snowy white hackle pads. While waiting for my packages I had made the felt shapes for the feathers and my husband had made the wire frame.
The day the supplies arrived I set to work and by early evening I had a feather shape and the beginnings of the jewel:

Start of an Odette headpiece

Ideally, you need to try the feather shape on the dancer so that you can trim the feathers but since I could not do that I tried the headpiece on my daughter and then carefully trimmed, glued and sewed the feathers in place. The difference between this head pieces and the original one I made for Leila was remarkable. Real stones are just so much more sparkly and having the right shape to the feathers is more elegant.
Don't get me wrong. Leila looked stunning in her costume and the headpiece was beautiful but the new headpiece was just more so. Judge for your self:

original Odette headpiece

new Odette, sent to California

Now that I have so many beautiful supplies I am going to create another Odile (black swan) headpiece and I have been drawing designs for a slew of other ones. I am especially inspired to make some beautiful  fairy ones. I'll keep you posted on how that  goes.

More headpieces: Raymonda, Le Corsaire, La Esmeralda, Diana and Acteaon etc.

I confess I went a little crazy the other day and started making some headpieces...at present I am up to 12 and counting. What brought this on? Cabin fever? (it is currently snowing and cold) Just my average over-enthusiasm? Huge popular demand? Well a little bit of everything. I received several request over at my Etsy store for (unusual) headpieces but had nothing to offer. Since everyone wanted them yesterday, well I was unable to oblige. Also, I like making headpieces: all that glitter, all those jewels and laces it is just the most fun about costuming.
I also discovered that I had materials, lots and lots of materials and dh said that I could not bring another item into the house without getting rid of something. So.....
Many of the basic headpiece shapes were made according to Claudia Folts' instructions for tulle princess headpieces, as described in her book "Finishing touches",  some headpieces I saw online and the rest came from my very active imagination.
Here are some of the finished ones:
Several could be for Arabian or Oriental themed ballet roles and depending on the colors of the  costume (pinks, purple, blues etc.) would work.

La Bayadiere, Arabian style headpiece in pink, burgundy and purple modeled by Lydia

La Bayadiere, Arabian etc. in pink/burgundy and purple tulle

I made two green and gold headpieces  that would be great for La Esmeralda.One is a wire circlet with flat sequins while the other is built on a horsehair frame and has coin trim on it.

Swarovski hot fix stones along the front.

Most of the crystals I used were sewn or wired by hand and were Chinese crystals. They had been sold to me as Swarovski but when I received them it was clear to me that they were not (the facets on the crystals were not uniform or the coatings looked "oily). It would have cost too much to send them back and I figured that if I clearly label them as what they are (i.e. made in China imitations) and charged a much lower price for these headpieces than it would be okay to use them. The stones do still sparkle more than acrylic and they look good especially when inter-spaced with real Swarovski.  From now on I will only order from companies that can guarantee that the crystals are Swarovski or Precosia (i.e. they only come in factory sealed packs).
I made two headpiece with different shades of blue tulle and gold or silver trim, which would look lovely with a blue and gold or a blue and silver tutu. Possible ballet roles would be Raymonda, Le Corsaire or even La Bayadere: 

This headpiece could be for and Arabian themed role such as Solor (if it was turned the other way or had a feather added, or even something like the Pharoh's daughter:

I was very happy that I received a request for a custom made Raymonda headpiece for a lovely dancer in Florida. I shipped it out this morning and I am hoping that she will be very happy with it because it was so much more beautiful than the photo lets on. I also hope that I will get some great press from it because if she likes it and her friends like it etc. than I might get a few more customers.

A Raymonda headpiece made for a customer in royal blue, black velvet and dark purple

Having a custom order and another sale motivated me to finish more.
The headpiece that is my current favorite is the Diana and Actaeon headpiece. It is a wreath of gold plastic leaves dotted with hand-sewn red Chinese bicone crystals.

Diana headpiece

After a lot of fiddeling around I made a redish-gold center moon applique and added some large crystal AB rhinestones to it. All of these items are so hard to photograph but I think this gives a pretty good idea of what it looks like.

Completed Diana headpiece with center moon shaped jewel

I am also working on one in silver and pale blue, possibly with some silver stars and a Talisman or other oriental princess crown using a very pretty lace.

Finally I have been learning how to make flowers using flower petals and making real silk flowers. I found an online book/picture tutorial from Prudence millinery (she makes hats for Vivienne Westwood among others) which was very good. I started by dying some silk organza I had into lovely sorbet colors and once I get my sewing room in a bit more shape, I'll start making the flowers. I'll keep you posted!

Other styles of hair decorations

During the past few weeks I have been learning how to make a variety of (ballet) hair decorations.  One set is loosely based on the Japanese art called tsumani kanzashi, which uses silk and sometimes cotton fabric squares. There are a large number of tutorials on YouTube that show how to fold and pinch the flowers. I was truly inspired by this  kanzashi documentary. It is all in Japanese, no comments but I was still able to "understand" what they were doing by watching. Japaneses kanzashi uses habotai silk, a glue made from rice starch, and all the bases are hand-made of metal disks or even card board.
When I started I used mostly polyester and nylon organza and charmeuse, which you can melt to stop the edges fraying. What I ended up making was more traditional style flowers.
While digging through my vast fabric stash I found some real silk and started folding the tiny squares. I also ordered some of the special rice starch to make the glue but it has not yet arrived.

At my Etsy store I received a number of request for (uncommon) headpieces or head-dresses and I realized that I really needed to have more on offer so... After doing a lot of research into the various ballets (Talisman, Diana and Acteaon, the Pharoh's daughter, La Esmeralda etc.) I realized that several have "oriental" (in this case meaning other than Western) or "ethnic" themes. Ballet's interpretation of this is a sort of mis-mash nationalities. I loved some of the photos I found of traditional Thai, Chinese, Chaldean, Roman, Greek and Indonesian wedding headpieces and went a little crazy.

Start of a Diana (or Acteaon?) headpiece in gold

Besides discovering that I have too much stuff, I had a lot of fun and have put together some nice things. Some are built on light weight wire and fabric circles

Le Corsaire, or Gamzatti?

Solar?

Same headpiece but with gem down

or on horse hair

Flowers on horse hair

or on horse hair and rigelene frames:

La Esmeralda, not sure if I will add the coin trim

Possibly a Diana headpiece in silver with a diamante moon.

My husband makes most of my wire frames which are needed for the more heavily, jewel encrusted head dresses but I will have to wait for those.
None are finished yet but I will post photos once they are.

Spanish skirts and practice tutus

Several weeks ago, I blogged about the Spanish skirts and the practice tutus I had been making. Thanks to Stephanie Harris of Harris photographyhttps://www.facebook.com/pages/Harris-Photgraphy/366353280120806?ref=ts&fref=ts and Annelise, Catherine, Bridget and Gabrielle, soloists and senior dancers at the Ithaca Ballet for participating in my first photo shoot.
The costumes highlighted each individual dancers unique beauty and style (and I ran out of adjectives to describe them; I mean how many ways can you state the obvious that these girls look magnificent?!)

Bridget and Catherine look gorgeous in these Spanish skirts

 Bridget looks regal and beautiful in this four tiered Spanish skirt in black and

Soloist Catherine embodies a Spanish princess in this Spanish skirt with matching mantilla and rose headpiece

Annelise personifies the icy beauty of the Snow Queen.
This costume includes a stunning Russian style headpiece

Practice tutus are available for sale at my Etsy site or via SharpSewingNY facebook page.

These tutus are perfect for class: 

Practice tutus in pink, white and black
Perfect for class 

 

Rehearsal: 

Catherine soars in her practice tutu, customized with a double hand-pleated top layer.

Or Performance:

Catherine, Bridget and Annelise take a bow

Catherine, Bridget and Annelise

Soloists Catherine (at left) and Annelise (at right) model their practice tutus
Catherine's tutu has a double hand-pleated top layer and Annelelise's tutu is custom sized.

The dancer's also modeled some of the custom made items that I offer:

Annelise models a custom made Sugar plum performance tutu

Side of the bun: fun little headpieces

During the last few weeks I have been trying my hand at making head pieces, that sit at the side of the bun.

Hand made organza rose with hot fix Swarovski crystals

The complete set of instructions on how to make these can be found in Claudia Folts book: Finishing Touches.  The flowers can be made of silk, organza or other polyester fabric. Individual petals are cut and then sewn or glued together and mounted on hair pins,  a decorated shape of lace, fabric and/or netting. Depending on the costume style crystals, lace, beads, sequins and trims can be added to embellish the headpiece.

For a Spanish style costume I made a mantilla and then added a fabric rose to it.

Spanish style mantilla with fabric rose

ruffle, ruffle, ruffle= new tutus and some Spanish skirts

I finally bit the bullet and have made a start on new tutus. One of my big dreams is to build a collection of costumes to offer for rent or sale and have real live people rent or buy them. My dreams are big but my budget and wallet are not. Also, very few people "know" my work.  Seriously, would you shell out upwards of $500 to a complete stranger to make something for you? No, neither would I.
I am hoping though that a few people might be willing to take a chance of renting something, see the quality of my work and then decide to buy.
Efin, what have I started making?
Over the summer I attended Tutu.com's tutu school and besides working really really hard, I learned to make some beautiful items including Spanish skirts. I also went to a mill store with my mother and found some wonderful black and burgundy fabric which just had that Latin feel to it.

A Spanish skirt takes between 40-42 yards of ruffled lace trim which even at the low price of 50 cents a yard gets pricy. You can imagine how  happy I was to find several yards of lovely burgundy lace at a thrift store for next to nothing. All it required was for me to cut it into strips and ruffle it.

Strips of lace to be ruffled for trim

Next I cut out the fabric for the under skirt and the four tiers of ruffles and started ruffling.

Underskirt, lace strips and fabric ruffles

Ruffling lace for trim

After ruffling lace for what seemed like days, I sewed my trim to the fabric layers of the skirt and then went back to ruffling the fabric layers.

First ruffled layer sewn onto underskirt

After each layer was ruffled, it had to be pinned and sewn onto the underskirt. The fabric I used didn't ruffle as tightly as the sparkle organza I had used previously so I spent a lot of time pulling up the gathering threads. Still as each layer was sewn on the skirt began to take on a lovely shape.

layer 2 sewn on, half way there

Layer 3, one more layer to go!

Once I reached the top layer, there was a lot of lace and fabric but the skirts really looked good. After the top layer was sewn on, the basque was attached, then hooks and eyes and voila, a super ruffly Spanish skirt.

The other projects I worked on was a tutu for a competition. I decide to use a stretch satin to make the bodice and basque since i had found 12 yards of it a local thrift store again for next to nothing. The fabric was great to work with (surprisingly easy) but once made I was not happy with how it looked.

The Snow Queen (by Hans Christen Anderson )

costume

The sheen on the satin made the whole ensemble a little too Halloween costume like. Good news was that the costume was for a Halloween contest but it wasn't what I had originally envisioned. I may some day remake this in a silk chiffon.

Kokoshnick style headpiece

Together with dh, I did make a stunning headpiece. It was done as a Russian kokshnik, with silver mesh, diamante jewels, crystals and some lovely trims. The front diamond was made of a vintage diamante triangle (possibly it was a brooch or a belt buckle).

white practice tutu

The final thing I worked on were three practice tutus, two black and one white. Thanks to all I had learned at tutu school (and the fact that I had surpassed the 90th tutu mark) these went together much, much easier than in the past and the result was even better.
My next project will be to finally take the online craftsy class, the couture dress, I started on this summer and give tutus a rest for a few weeks.