The hat of a queen

I had my birthday back in June and there was a distinct historical theme in the presents that I got, but that's a subject for another post. Here I want to talk about the hat I got from my parents when became the hat for my Marie Antoinette costume.

I'm sure you are all very familiar with the portrait I was copying but in case you aren't here it is again.

The hat that I received was 'Straw Hat late 18th-19th century' from Nehelenia Patterns, I then decorated it with the powder blue ostrich feathers and satin ribbon that I bought from Barnett Lawson way back in January.

Sorry for the strange colours. My mother took this and didn't realise I had a filter on.

 Because the feathers I bought were spads (AKA the slightly less awesome ones), not primes I had to do some stuff to them to make them prettier. I didn't mind this because instead of spending £17 on each other I spent £3.
The first thing I did was curl the feathers in with my curling iron, this in itself made them look fuller. Then I curled the shaft or spine of the feather by digging my thumbnail in and bending the feather over it at intervals. This is how I got them from practically straight to the lovely curl you can see beneath.

This hat is made large so that it will fit over the large hairstyles of the 1780s and 90s so I couldn't take a photo of it on my head when I'd just finished it but I promise you that I have photos of it on and they are wonderful!