Making A Straw Hat By Lorraine Cooper
 
Materials
1:12th Scale Hat Straw available in a variety of wonderful colours
Pair of Scissors
Fabric or PVA Glue
½ - ¾ inch Wooden Dowel Rod or you can use the cap from a small medicine bottle.
Lace, Ribbon, Braid, Miniature Flowers etc.
Steam Iron or dry Iron with damp cloth
 

Stage One: You will find fine cord woven through either side of the hat straw. Begin by locating this and pulling this cord gently on one side only to curl the straw (see Fig. 1) You need to be firm and a little brave but if you pull it too hard you may break it or pulling it through completely. You will find that the straw begins to curl neatly.


Now take some fabric glue the (or you can stitch if you wish) straw into a ½ to ¾ inch tight circle. I advise you to overlap the edge very, very slightly on what will be your wrong side. Cut the end of the straw at an angle to help hide the cut end. Then press this flat with a steam iron (see Fig. 2).
 
Fig.1     Fig. 2
 

Stage Two: Now glue two flat strips of hat braid long enough to go around the circumference of the crown together lengthwise. It is advisable to glue the second strip slightly overlapping the first depending upon the height of the crown you desire. I would advise you to use a ½ or ¾ inch dowel rod as I have done in Fig. 3 as this will help you to form a good shape for the crown of your hat. Carefully glue ends together around the dowel so that the frayed edges are not visible (you might find that again a slight overlap helps) Now put a thin line of glue around the top of the upper layer and place the flat circle you made in stage one Fig.2 on top and leave to dry for approx 1hour to ensue the glue is set. You can always add more glue on the inside later if you find it isn’t firm enough.

Fig.3          Fig. 4
 

Stage Three: Take approx. 7-8 inches of hat straw and pull the cord again as in step 1. But this time instead of making a tight circle as in the crown, leave a hole in the centre that is approx. 5/8 inch in diameter (see Fig. 4). Curl around approx 3 times gluing each subsequent layer just overlapping as before onto the previous layer. Again the number of times you curl the brim will depend upon how wide you require it to be. Cut the end of the straw at an angle and glue to the wrong side of the brim to finish off.
 
Stage Four: Now remove your crown from the dowel once dry and place it on top of the brim using a further thin line of glue around the edge of the crown base. You can now decorate your hat using lace, braid and ribbon as I have done in Fig. 5 or using flowers and ribbon, the choice is entirely yours!
 
 
Fig 5    
 

All the materials to make this hat and the full hat kit itself can be found on my main web site www.lorraineminiatures.com or can be accessed by clicking the link 'main site' in the menue bar to the left.