Millinery: A hat to go with a suit

This is a buckram framed hat. Buckram is a material that looks like stiff window screen, and it looks like the screen was coated with paint. I cut out a piece of buckram to make the shape of the top (tip) of the hat, another piece to make the sides, and another to make the brim. I actually used two pieces ironed together in layers to make the brim extra stiff.
Then I stitched millinery wire to each part. Millinery wire looks like regular wire covered with thread. Then I covered the wire with French Elastic, or bias. It looks like one inch wide gauze, but it is stiff. I stitched the bias so it encased the wire. Then I stitched all the pieces of the hat together, through the bias. Then I covered each piece with fabric. In this case, I used a white polyester satin, using the wrong side so it would look like crepe. All together, this hat took me about 15 hours to make: that includes shopping for fabric and ribbons, making the flowers, cutting out fabric and buckram, wiring, lining, putting in a sweat band.
I learned a lot about attaching a brim to buckram. I had done that before, but this time I was a lot more confident.
It was fun to try to make a hat to co-ordinate with a suit. I'll see if I can get Gayle to model her new chapeaux before she takes it home! She's a great customer, and a lovely friend.

PS: Finding the zebra stripped ribbon to match the suit's cuff and border was such great serendipity!