The aim of this competition was to create a hat based on a “cocktail drink”
I chose the Frozen Strawberry Daiquiri. My favourite cocktail.
The name of the hat is ‘Tipsy” as the handmade handdyed sinamay strawberries tumble out of the cocktail glass.
All elements in this hat were totally constructed by hand- there is no plastic martini glass under the glass canvas of the cocktail glass. The straw is handmade with thin metal shim, carefully rolled with a spiral of red to create that “twist” look. The glass canvas used to create the glass and the hat shape are unique materials to Wendy Scully Millinery.
Each strawberry was hand created. First step was to carve base strawberry shapes from foam, four were created to make different sized strawberries. The foam shapes were then ‘blocked’ in handdyed red sinamay. The sinamay was carefully removed. The created strawberries were then hand stitched to create the final strawberry shape with the leaves on the top made of velvet. Hand beading was the last step to create the hollow see-through strawberries.
This piece was awarded 2nd place in the MAA ‘ISO’ competition. It also received a special mention from Mr Stephen Jones MBE- the millinery designer for Dior. He was amazed by the “detail and quality of workmanship- esp of the strawberries”