Ophelia Bonnet Homestretch

In case you missed the squeals of delight on Facebook, my silks are finally here! Ordered in the middle of March, I endured shipping delays, wrong items being sent, secondary packages which were also delayed...

My beautiful silk from India! Color is actually dark navy.

Yeah, patience has certainly become a virtue where this project is concerned (it was started in early February). Along with my silk issues, I had supplies run out on multiple occasions, which resulted in more delays and frustrations that nearly made me throw in the towel for the whole project.

Before getting started on the covering and trimmings, I'll give a quick progress report on how the actual bonnet construction went.

This was my first venture into hat making where I constructed the base myself. Once I had all my supplies together, it went together very easily, much to my surprise (aside from running out of a few things - AGAIN - during the construction process).

Millinery wire taped and ready to be sewn to the buckram.

Finished crown, pipe, and brim. These are the pieces that make up the full bonnet.

The crown piece and brim are attached to each other using just a whipstitch around the wire and crinoline tape.

Finished form ready for covering.

Like most hand sewing projects though, very slow going but the outcome is certainly rewarding. Although the the buckram form has been sitting around for a bit now, I still look at it and go, "I made that?" Now looking forward to finishing it.

These are all my trimmings which I have been slowly accumulating during the project.

The plan is to cover it with blue silk and line the brim with cream dupioni (not completely period accurate, but this will be on the inside and not as noticeable). Still have to play with the ribbons, but the wide cream will be used for the ties, and the thinner cream and pale green for pipe trims. The flowers, bing cherries, and leaves will go at the very top of the crown, similar to the ones in my research plates.

Keep your fingers crossed that the next time I post about the bonnet, it will be finished!

And just for fun, a late night selfie from when I had actually finished the bonnet.