Project: Blue foam hatblocks for Fosshape millinery
We're in full swing with production on The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, the largest show our theatre has ever produced. If you've been reading labricoleuse for a while, you know that it's a huge deal around here--we've gotten a big NEA grant for all the work we're doing above and beyond the show itself under the auspices of the Dickens Initiative via partnerships with our regional libraries, book clubs, businesses, and so forth.
I've been restricting most of my "NickNick-related" blogging about it to our official production blog, Nicholas Nickleby: Page to Stage, which is aggregated on LJ as nicknickleby, but those posts have been more for a general audience. This one marks the beginning of a two-part series strictly for y'all here, as it's a lot more technical in its focus.
One of the hats i'm making for the show is a fairly unusual bonnet form, for a character called "Rich Lady," a demanding customer in Madame Mantalini's Millinery salon.
close-up of hat design from costume rendering by Jan Chambers
Check out the crazy hyperboloid swoop from crown to brim on that bonnet! When i saw this rendering, i knew i was going to have to make that hat, and i couldn't wait.
I thought about various methods for it--a wire frame structure was one early idea--but ultimately decided i needed a hat block in that shape, not only because it allows me greater freedom in terms of an ultimate foundation choice, but because my shop would benefit from having a bonnet block as a resource for potential future use as well. The wire frame is a great choice for a lightweight and/or transparent cover fabric, but it's got no advantage if the fabric chosen is opaque or heavy, and i'm expecting a cotton velvet or similar winter-weight fabric choice for this hat. With a custom carved bonnet block, i could use it to do a traditional blocked felt shape, or a thermoformable felt (Fosshape) base shape, or even to use one of my super precious rare-as-the-dodo sheets of esparterie or willow, a millinery material which is no longer manufactured but which i own 3.75 sheets of.
(If you are familiar with the Seinfeld episode in which Julia rates her dates as "spongeworthy" or not, this is the millinery equivalent of that exact sentiment.)
If you've ever thought about making your own hatblocks but don't have the woodworking skills or tools to do traditional ones, this technique is one to try. I briefly touched on it in the photoessays i posted back in August, when i attended the USITT Costume Commission Symposium on creature heads; this is basically utilizing that technique but to make a hat block rather than a head matrix.
So, the first thing you need to do is get some blue foam, aka polyisocyanurate foam or residential insulation foam. Dow is the major manufacturer of this product in the US, and you can get it in sheets at your building materials store (Home Depot or Lowes). It comes in different thicknesses--the thickest i can find locally is 1" but we had 2" at the symposium. One sheet of the 1" thick foam was about 5' by 20', cost under $20, and i didn't even use half of it to stack up my block.
blue foam
This stuff has an MSDS and be sure to read it. It comes with plastic sealed onto each side and you will want to peel that off in a well-ventilated area, as it releases traces of cyanide gas. You'll also want some kind of particulate respiratory protection when you cut and carve it.
I cut my sheet into pieces with an electric serrated knife.
They get progressively smaller and stack up like a ziggurat to conserve material and carving time.
The layers are glued together with an adhesive called Fastbond by 3M.
Fastbond is a water-based rubber cement that sticks well to this foam.
In addition to the electric knife, a curry comb (at right) is good for sculpting.
Note work gloves, because that curry comb can rake off your flesh.
On the top you can see the circle noting the tip of the bonnet crown.
It's looking more like a bonnet now!
Note how you can use the glue lines between layers as registration lines for carving.
I just need to shave a bit more away and sand it smooth...
Voila! A hyperboloid bonnet block, custom carved!
I decided to go with Fosshape thermoformable felt for my bonnet base structure. (Sad to say, but this bonnet is too large for me to deem it spongeworthy willow-worthy.) Fosshape comes in a light and heavy weight, and can be stiffened with heat and pressure, yet still stitched through by hand or machine.
You can get it from a number of sources, but i get mine from Dazian. I gather Dazian has just produced some instructional videos on using it, which will soon be available on DVD--the guy who made them was talking about that recently at the symposium. I don't see them on their site, but if you order by phone it's worth asking in case they just haven't listed them yet.
ETA 10/5/09: Shoot a PM to nonwoven if you'd like samples and a copy of Dazian's how-to CD with instructions from costume designer and crafts artisan Bill Brewer.
I find that Fosshape works best on odd shapes when i put a couple of seams into it, so i knew i'd want to take a pattern from my block. I used the same kind of technique that wigmasters use when taking a head wrap and hairline trace for a custom lace-front wig.
First, I mummified the block with clingfilm and clear packing tape,
then transferred my front, back, and side markings.
(Yes, that's my pink rabbit head there in the back looking on.)
Pattern pieces freshly cut from the block.
Pattern pieces trued up and drafted in paper.
I then cut these out of Fosshape 600 (the thicker kind--this bonnet needs to be very sturdy), allowing for 20% shrinkage, as you lose some surface area when Fosshape takes heat and solidifies. I also re-mummfied the foam block, this time with aluminum foil and foil tape, to provide a good heat-resistant surface on which to block my hat.
Foiled block on the left, Fosshape hat form on the right.
Foreground: mini-iron and specialty heads for fine shaping work.
You'll note that the block doesn't have quite the undercut at the crown tip that the rendering has. This is because i figure, it is easier to remove material than to add it back, and it's possible in the fitting that we learn we need more diameter in the crown there. I can always go back and carve more out, and reblock a new front piece if required, or even take a fisheye dart out of the piece i've got to create a more extreme curve. I'd like to keep the block this less-extreme, more historically accurate shape if possible though, as it'll be more useful in the long run. Still, time will tell and the fitting may bring a second round of carving.
That's where i'm at with this. The Rich Lady gets fit on Tuesday, so we'll hopefully know more about where to go from here then!
I've been restricting most of my "NickNick-related" blogging about it to our official production blog, Nicholas Nickleby: Page to Stage, which is aggregated on LJ as nicknickleby, but those posts have been more for a general audience. This one marks the beginning of a two-part series strictly for y'all here, as it's a lot more technical in its focus.
One of the hats i'm making for the show is a fairly unusual bonnet form, for a character called "Rich Lady," a demanding customer in Madame Mantalini's Millinery salon.
close-up of hat design from costume rendering by Jan Chambers
Check out the crazy hyperboloid swoop from crown to brim on that bonnet! When i saw this rendering, i knew i was going to have to make that hat, and i couldn't wait.
I thought about various methods for it--a wire frame structure was one early idea--but ultimately decided i needed a hat block in that shape, not only because it allows me greater freedom in terms of an ultimate foundation choice, but because my shop would benefit from having a bonnet block as a resource for potential future use as well. The wire frame is a great choice for a lightweight and/or transparent cover fabric, but it's got no advantage if the fabric chosen is opaque or heavy, and i'm expecting a cotton velvet or similar winter-weight fabric choice for this hat. With a custom carved bonnet block, i could use it to do a traditional blocked felt shape, or a thermoformable felt (Fosshape) base shape, or even to use one of my super precious rare-as-the-dodo sheets of esparterie or willow, a millinery material which is no longer manufactured but which i own 3.75 sheets of.
(If you are familiar with the Seinfeld episode in which Julia rates her dates as "spongeworthy" or not, this is the millinery equivalent of that exact sentiment.)
If you've ever thought about making your own hatblocks but don't have the woodworking skills or tools to do traditional ones, this technique is one to try. I briefly touched on it in the photoessays i posted back in August, when i attended the USITT Costume Commission Symposium on creature heads; this is basically utilizing that technique but to make a hat block rather than a head matrix.
So, the first thing you need to do is get some blue foam, aka polyisocyanurate foam or residential insulation foam. Dow is the major manufacturer of this product in the US, and you can get it in sheets at your building materials store (Home Depot or Lowes). It comes in different thicknesses--the thickest i can find locally is 1" but we had 2" at the symposium. One sheet of the 1" thick foam was about 5' by 20', cost under $20, and i didn't even use half of it to stack up my block.
blue foam
This stuff has an MSDS and be sure to read it. It comes with plastic sealed onto each side and you will want to peel that off in a well-ventilated area, as it releases traces of cyanide gas. You'll also want some kind of particulate respiratory protection when you cut and carve it.
I cut my sheet into pieces with an electric serrated knife.
They get progressively smaller and stack up like a ziggurat to conserve material and carving time.
The layers are glued together with an adhesive called Fastbond by 3M.
Fastbond is a water-based rubber cement that sticks well to this foam.
In addition to the electric knife, a curry comb (at right) is good for sculpting.
Note work gloves, because that curry comb can rake off your flesh.
On the top you can see the circle noting the tip of the bonnet crown.
It's looking more like a bonnet now!
Note how you can use the glue lines between layers as registration lines for carving.
I just need to shave a bit more away and sand it smooth...
Voila! A hyperboloid bonnet block, custom carved!
I decided to go with Fosshape thermoformable felt for my bonnet base structure. (Sad to say, but this bonnet is too large for me to deem it spongeworthy willow-worthy.) Fosshape comes in a light and heavy weight, and can be stiffened with heat and pressure, yet still stitched through by hand or machine.
You can get it from a number of sources, but i get mine from Dazian. I gather Dazian has just produced some instructional videos on using it, which will soon be available on DVD--the guy who made them was talking about that recently at the symposium. I don't see them on their site, but if you order by phone it's worth asking in case they just haven't listed them yet.
ETA 10/5/09: Shoot a PM to nonwoven if you'd like samples and a copy of Dazian's how-to CD with instructions from costume designer and crafts artisan Bill Brewer.
I find that Fosshape works best on odd shapes when i put a couple of seams into it, so i knew i'd want to take a pattern from my block. I used the same kind of technique that wigmasters use when taking a head wrap and hairline trace for a custom lace-front wig.
First, I mummified the block with clingfilm and clear packing tape,
then transferred my front, back, and side markings.
(Yes, that's my pink rabbit head there in the back looking on.)
Pattern pieces freshly cut from the block.
Pattern pieces trued up and drafted in paper.
I then cut these out of Fosshape 600 (the thicker kind--this bonnet needs to be very sturdy), allowing for 20% shrinkage, as you lose some surface area when Fosshape takes heat and solidifies. I also re-mummfied the foam block, this time with aluminum foil and foil tape, to provide a good heat-resistant surface on which to block my hat.
Foiled block on the left, Fosshape hat form on the right.
Foreground: mini-iron and specialty heads for fine shaping work.
You'll note that the block doesn't have quite the undercut at the crown tip that the rendering has. This is because i figure, it is easier to remove material than to add it back, and it's possible in the fitting that we learn we need more diameter in the crown there. I can always go back and carve more out, and reblock a new front piece if required, or even take a fisheye dart out of the piece i've got to create a more extreme curve. I'd like to keep the block this less-extreme, more historically accurate shape if possible though, as it'll be more useful in the long run. Still, time will tell and the fitting may bring a second round of carving.
That's where i'm at with this. The Rich Lady gets fit on Tuesday, so we'll hopefully know more about where to go from here then!