The Ascot Hat

You have probably gathered that at Lesley's Girls HQ upcycling is a hot topic at the moment... and it seems to be spilling into everything we do.  From Susannah's maternity clothes (post to come) to my hat for Ascot.

Following on from last week's Ascot post, as promised here is the post on my upcycled vintage vinyl hat.  I really stressed about what hat to wear, and I racked my brains and decided I would make it myself so it would be something a bit different... I toyed with the idea of buying a sinamay base and constructing one, but I ended up creating one from a vinyl 7 inch record.  I had seen the pictures of Katy Perry in one last year and it got me thinking- it's a natural tilt hat base and so an easy starting point.  So I got to work.  

The raw materials.

Setting the vinyl base was easy, and attaching the veil tricky but straight forward, the process got tricky when I had to decide what I would decorate it with... hundreds of flowers, feathers and mesh combinations were tested out, and I terrorised Instagram and Twitter demanding opinions from all and sundry before I attached anything on permanently.

And the final result.  

It's a bit novelty, a bit 1940s and a bit burlesque.  It may have been obvious I had made it myself and it may have been completely random when compared to everyone else's hat on the day, but I don't care because I absolutely love it and I was doubly excited to wear it knowing I made it all by myself.


It was my first attempt and I can see it now.  Really the clips should have been a comb or perhaps attached to a band as it was forever slipping on my hair all day.  And I think next time I would like to experiment with using two vinyls of different sizes, I was also a bit disappointed that the flowers and feathers got so squashed (but that was because I used a massive weight to ensure they stuck firmly as I was being over cautious!)  But I will definitely try it again should the occasion demand it!  Since making the hat I have had a search on Google and Etsy and I finds that this others have too experimented with vinyl hats, the great thing about them is that every one is unique and therefore you could almost never find two exactly the same!

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