'The Kiss'

Maria Carmen Melnic

United Kingdom

• Pleated Sinamay Headpiece Project by Katherine Elizabeth
• Retro Bridal Veil by Michelle@Petershams

Like every milliner would, I wanted to create something unique, and my inspiration came from Katherine Elizabeth’s December 2020 article “Pleated sinamay headpiece tutorial” and a project on HATalk webpage: “Retro bridal veil”. I knew I wanted to fashion a fascinator, blocking it on a pill box. Once I finished that, I went about enhancing the fascinator using a simple yet elegant face veil, combining it with hand shaped feathers. To adjust it to my pill box, I made some changes to the way the veil is attached to the head piece. Instead of flowers, I decorated or rather highlighted the veil, using rhinestones I fashioned the shape of a kiss. Then the decisions for the feather’s shape and colour were easy: what would complement a kiss better than a heart? And then to balance out the red, I added 3 small white feathers again fashioned into heart shapes. I covered the edge of the feathers with a pom-pom kind of trim I made from the ostrich feathers (making use of the remainders left after trimming the big red heart).

The end product - Elegant, yet cheeky – The Kiss. I loved creating this fascinator. I hope that whoever wears my creation enjoys it as much as I did fashioning an idea into a smile.

• Red Sinamay
• Black Petersham
• 2 red ostrich feathers
• 3 pigeons feathers (presents from some pigeons, I have been feeding them for a few months)
• Black ribbon
• Lining fabric
• Metal hairband
• White French veil
• Cotton covered millinery wire
• Red rhinestones gems
• Red and black thread
• Needle
• Pins
• Pill box block
• Stiffener
• Glue

• Blocking sinamay
• Steaming the sinamay
• Stiffening the sinamay
• Wiring
• Veil tacking and stitching
• Covering the hairband in ribbon
• Gluing the rhinestones
• Cutting and trimming the feathers