Hat making?? Learning Millinery..

[belfastboy]

Well, I purchased some Revlon Hair dye or maybe Hare dye since the fur felt is 100% rabbit, this time I went with a dark auburn color. I followed the instructions, except I added a equal amount of water, mixed everything up, then applied the dye using a paint brush, then I followed the instructions for the amount of time to leave the dye coated hat to soak and that was my mistake, wait time was only 30 minutes. I rinsed the dye out of the hat and put the hat back on the block to dry. The color either didn't take or it just slightly darkened the hat, so much that I can't even see a difference. I guess that I will try another dry in 2 weeks time.

This is the result of the second dye work. I did manage to get the wrinkles out, I am using a different method of blocking my hat felts after ironing the brim out nice and flat. I have been using a blocking spring and blocking cord when I put the hat body on the block, and I am thinking that maybe I need to buy a Tolliker, maybe using steam in combo with a Tolliker, setting the brim break maybe just a bit easier to do. Anyone have any suggestions about making a brim break?
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I made my own tollicker......crude but it works.

 

[Darrell2688]

Hi BB,

Well, I have decided to take a shot at making my own Tollicker also. I will be using the small one that I made a few months back and add a longer curved base to it, along with a lot of sanding and shaping, hopefully it will work out.

 

[TWKundrat]

Just finished a new one last night

 

[Darrell2688]

I am moving really slow on the hat that I am making; I was able to locate some ribbon for the hat on Etsy, the color is called syrup. It is just a little darker than the hat color and I have decided to do a little pouncing on the hat all over then spray with alcohol and flame it just long enough to burn off the loose fibers. Then I need to decide to cut the brim down, I can cut it down to 3" wide or up to 3-1/2" wide. Then sew the brim binding in place, build a leather sweatband and stitch it in place, make a pencil curl and a 1" wide grosgrain ribbon hatband, black silk liner. This will take some time; I will be going into the local hospital Friday for a out patient procedure, but I will be back to finish this hat. Here are a few photos of the hat with the syrup colored ribbon. As you can see the brim is a darker color than the crown, maybe when I do some pouncing and flame it, there maybe some mottling, I will have to wait and see.

 

[Darrell2688]

I have been away for a while, but I managed to work on my Tolliker about 3 weeks ago. Here are some photos of my re-work of my first attempt and it works, I used it on the Camel colored hat that I have been working on. It isn't pretty, but it does work.

 

[Darrell2688]

I started working on a new leather sweatband today. I have been busy hand sewing the reeding tape and reed onto the new leather strip that will be a sweatband, not sure how long this will take, my thread keeps getting twisted into knots. I guess that I will have to learn how to use a sewing machine, but then I am not sure how my wife's sewing machine will do with leather. Each stitch is about 1/8" apart and the leather is 25" long, the small plastic clips work great holding everything together as I sew.

 

[ChicagoWayVito]

I started working on a new leather sweatband today. I have been busy hand sewing the reeding tape and reed onto the new leather strip that will be a sweatband, not sure how long this will take, my thread keeps getting twisted into knots. I guess that I will have to learn how to use a sewing machine, but then I am not sure how my wife's sewing machine will do with leather. Each stitch is about 1/8" apart and the leather is 25" long, the small plastic clips work great holding everything together as I sew.
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Mind sharing where you picked up reading tape?

 

[Darrell2688]

I purchased the reeding tape and reed from https://www.hatsupply.com/mens-hats-supplies/mens-hat-making-supplies/ , they have everything that you would want for hats, sweatbands, bows, fur felts, liners, ferrules. There is a minimum amount you have to purchase.

 

[Darrell2688]

It has been a while since I last posted anything, that was due to a few things, the last thing was attending a wedding, son got married after 15-year engagement, that is another story. Anyway, I recently finished all of the sewing on the sweatband. My next step will be to cut the brim down on the hat to 3 1/4", then stitch the sweatband into the hat after I add a small ribbon to the sweatband of course. Here are a few photos of the sweatband, so far.

 

[Darrell2688]

This has to be my slowest pace for making a hat. I sewed the bow onto the sweatband today then decided to sew the sweatband into the hat and this is my progress so far. Next step, I will sew the ribbon, hatband in place complete with a bow and then the liner. Sewing the ribbon on the brim edge is going to be a learning experience, because it will be a first for me to sew the brim edge on and using a sewing machine, plus the sewing machine is a Singer, no guide to fold the ribbon.

 

[Darrell2688]

Well, I am back, I have made a little more progress on my hat project. I watched a few videos on YouTube and tried a new way of making the hat band and bow a single complete unit, I figured out how to do it, however I decided to go with the old way and made the bow separate. For some reason the bow looked to long using the method of creating a complete bow-hat band unit. Any way here are a few photos of my progress so far. I have the brim binding clamped to the hat brim with metal clamps, the next step will be hand sewing the binding to the brim, this part will be interesting, the first time for brim binding for me, plus hand sewing it to the brim and getting the stitches spaced right.

 

[Darrell2688]

Well, it took most of the day, but I managed to hand sew the brim binding into place. Hand sewing can be a challenge, the thread will twist into knots very easy, so you have to keep one hand on the thread as you pull the needle through the fabric, I know because I use a bit of time untying knots. Here are a few photos of the finished brim binding sewing, take a peek and let me know what you think.

 

[Darrell2688]

After sewing the binding on the brim there are a few ways to go with this hat, I could make this hat into a Fedora with either a teardrop shape or the Indiana Jones bash, or I could make the hat a Fedora with a pencil curl, or I could keep the open crown and put a pencil curl in the hat.

The hat has a 3 1/4" wide brim and a 6" open crown.

I think that I will do an Indiana Jones Fedora bash on this hat, every time that I look at this hat, I think Fedora so that is what I will be doing. I will be working on that this evening; it might be a little difficult since I do not have a flange made for a wide brim, plus it has the hat band tacked in place. The only flange that I have that might be close is a 7 1/2" and 2 1/2" brim, so the brim curve might just be free hand.

 

[Darrell2688]

Well, I made some small changes to my bow on this hat and here is a few photos for you to look at.

 

[Darrell2688]

Well, I decided to give this hat a Fedora bash with a flat brim slightly turned down in the front. The front has a tight pinch, and the top has a crease down the center. It would be easy to create a teardrop bash in the crown using this as a starting point. Any way here a few photos of the hat with the bash Fedora look and a photo of the silk liner installed. I think that I need to pay more attention when I am taking photos, believe it or not the brim is flat except for the front where it is turned down slightly, kind of a Snowy River style. Of course, if I am going for the Snowy River look, I will have to give the hat a teardrop bash. 

 

[Art Fawcett]

I like the changes you made to the bow, looks cleaner than it did before Sir. As for the thread twisting, run the thread through thread wax before starting. It won't completely clear up the problem but will help a lot.. Also, give the sweatband a slightly more angled cut before sewing the rear seam, it will help with the slight "pucker" in the sweat. Are you using ferrels in the sweat?

 

[Darrell2688]

I am getting ready to start another hat, this time it is a dark Grey. I am going to make this hat into a Fedora with a black Grosgrain hat band and bow, I will be making another sweatband for this hat, the silk liner is black.

 

[Darrell2688]

I like the changes you made to the bow, looks cleaner than it did before Sir. As for the thread twisting, run the thread through thread wax before starting. It won't completely clear up the problem but will help a lot.. Also, give the sweatband a slightly more angled cut before sewing the rear seam, it will help with the slight "pucker" in the sweat. Are you using ferrels in the sweat?

Hi Art,
Thank you, I made the corrections on the bow after someone else pointed out the problems with the bow work. I really appreciate the help, I am learning a lot. I never thought about using wax on thread for hat work, I use wax on thread when working with leather. I have two different type of wax, I have wax with glycerin and regular wax, the thread that I used on the brown hat for bow is a light weight. What angle should I cut the sweatband ends, I would like to avoid the pucker on the sweatband, I have been trying to figure out what I was doing wrong. I am using the little black metal Ferrals on my sweatbands and the reed is a small diameter. So far all dewing has been done by hand. Maybe I should check out a sewing machine to do a little sewing?

 

[Art Fawcett]

Although all of sweat my work was by "eye", 5 to 7 degrees cut at the rear of the sweat usually works well. This is something you'll have to experiment with. A sewing machine was always my friend

 

[Darrell2688]

Although all of sweat my work was by "eye", 5 to 7 degrees cut at the rear of the sweat usually works well. This is something you'll have to experiment with. A sewing machine was always my friend

I have been cutting the ends at 5 degrees, the problem may be that I am hand sewing the ends together, I cut the reed so it is about 1/2" longer than the sweatband and I have been sewing the reed tape onto the leather by hand also. Maybe I should look at buying a sewing machine? I checked out some Brother sewing machines today, maybe I could find one that will sew through leather, the leather that I am using is about 2mm thick. I will cut my next sweatband at 7 degree angle and see if that takes care of it.