How a New Hat Begins

People sometimes imagine that designing a hat starts with a finished picture in your head — every flower, feather and piece of trim already decided before you begin.

For me, it rarely works that way.

A new piece can begin with almost anything. It might be the shape of a hat base, a particular colour, a beautiful flower, an unusual feather, a piece of vintage trim, or something I have had tucked away for years waiting for the right project.

But what I eventually see in those materials comes from much further back.

I have always been interested in fashion and design, and over the years I have spent a lot of time studying the work of designers such as Christian Dior — particularly the way proportion, structure, shape and detail can completely change a silhouette.

There is one photograph of a Dior dress that I have carried with me since I was about 14 years old.

Something about it caught my attention then and has never really let go — the tiny waist, the extraordinary volume, the folds and structure, and that balance between elegance and drama.

I never kept the photograph because I wanted to reproduce the dress.

I kept it because it represented something about design that I loved.

More than thirty years later, it still does.

I am also naturally drawn to the elegance and glamour associated with women such as Audrey Hepburn, Rita Hayworth, Marilyn Monroe and Grace Kelly. They each had very different styles, but there was a confidence and polish to the way they dressed that continues to influence the things I notice.

 

 

I don't sit down at my worktable and decide that I am going to make something “Dior”, or recreate a particular period.

Those influences have simply become part of the way I look at design.

They are there when I consider the curve of a brim, where a flower should sit, whether something needs height or softness, whether the proportions feel right, or whether a design needs restraint — or perhaps just a little more drama.

Then I let the materials take the design somewhere of its own.

More tomorrow....

Helen Greville

Designer

Handmade in Melbourne by Bateman Original Designs.

Designed by Hand. Defined by Heritage.