A “Miss Fisher” 1920s Burgundy Cloche Hat

It pales in comparison to the original, but I’m quite happy with my burgundy Miss Fisher hat, retro-cycled from a sad garage sale find.

I know it’s February – practically Spring! – but I’m still working on my Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries wardrobe. I won’t call it a “Fall Wardrobe” anymore…just an all-the-time wardrobe. 🙂

So far I’ve made trousers, a blouse, a skirt, several cloche hats, and have bought some blouses too. I don’t claim to have any hat-making expertise beyond the one enlightening class I took at Costume College a couple years ago, but I do enjoy the sculpty-organic craft with my limited skill and supplies.

Crusty garage sale hat for $1.00

I bought a crusty old burgundy wool hat at a garage sale some months ago, soaked it to revert it back to a basic hood, and only recently blocked it into shape. I knew it was destined to become my version of this epic Mandy Murphy hat:

Hat by Mandy Murphy, for Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries

Of all the cloche hats I’ve made, this one was the most challenging because I wanted a nice arced brim, but needed to create it all-in-one with the crown.

Happily, it wasn’t as tough as expected, just took some careful trimming and pressing. I was surprised that the quite-small hood was able to produce a large enough brim to mimic the inspiration hat rather well.

My version with the brim turned up

I bound the un-wired brim in a burgundy velvet and stitched felt circles onto the side, like the inspiration. Mine definitely has a home-made look (I should at some point upgrade my circles to nicer materials), but women often re-shaped and decorated their hats in the ’20s, so I don’t feel bad at all about it.

And the best part? It goes with all the other pieces, current and planned. I really love this mix-and-match aspect. It makes dressing so easy, but also interesting enough to not look like you’re wearing the same thing every day!