Megan Hughes – Canada

Double Rose

Description

This headpiece both reveres and reinvents the rose, twice, and achieves a look that is both classic and modern at once. Revered in local gardens as well as internationally, the rose is one of the best known symbols of both tradition and hope across the globe. This perching, forward tilting fascinator, called “Double Rose,” balances two beautiful blooms in two, and three, dimensions. Using the rose as both a base image and an embellishment, the combination of these two special millinery recreations reflect the rose flower’s own symbolic nature as both a traditional icon and a tactile, contemporary reality. By its very nature the rose is one of the best known, yet customizable and personal symbols we use to describe human relationships, and to inhabit the essence of beauty itself. The much-interpreted colour “rose,” is shown here using a range of natural colour variations in each of this fascinator’s two flowers, reflecting and complimenting one another’s form, shadows and highlights. The harmonic relationships between the close-fitting perching base and floating embellishment, the complimentary colour design, and the use both traditional millinery technique and digital technology make this fascinator a truly unique design. Based in Toronto, Canada, Ms. Hughes is a student of fine millinery, as well as a photographer and rose gardener; creating this design was also a rewarding exercise in balancing her creative pursuits!

Materials

• Hand-painted silk dupioni
• Silk satin
• Blocked sinamay
• Digital image transfer
• Original digital image of rose
• Satin wrapped metal headband
• Petersham ribbon
• Millinery wire
• Silk dye
• Thread
• Interfacing

Techniques

• Captured digital image of self-gardened rose with dslr camera, edited image to size, printed to image transfer, applied image of rose to silk satin with heat press, blocked image on silk satin and then on to custom-blocked floating percher sinamay base
• Hand cut, enforced with interfacing, and hand-dyed silk dupioni rose petals, then assembled with needle and thread into one-of-a-kind double-centered 3D rose attached on to millinery wire, attached to base with thread and positioned, then sewn into place to float above the image-covered base
• Attached base and embellishment combination to satin wrapped headband with needle and thread
• Added hand sewn lining, petersham ribbon, and label