Using beautiful full-color tutorials, Jenny Pfanenstiel teaches the basics of hat-making, from materials and fabric selection to stitching and finishing. All of the projects are scaled for difficulty so that readers can learn each of the highlighted skills while creating their own hats. Styles include cloche, fascinator, straw-brimmed, and other hats.

"A great introduction for those interested in millinery, with easy to understand instructions and a variety of patterns for constructing different types of hats." — Jefferson-Madison Regional Library System Design the hat of your dreams with the guidance of an expert milliner. Jenny Pfanenstiel presents beautifully rendered, full-color tutorials that explain the basics of hat-making, from material selection to stitching and finishing. Seven designs, suitable for beginners as well as experienced hat makers, include cloche, cowboy, and straw-brimmed hats, as well as a variety of fascinators. Helpful suggestions range from how to measure your head and how to choose the style that best complements your face, to selecting feather flowers, hat pins, and other embellishments. Other tips cover setting up your work area and taking care of your hat. Loaded with hat trivia and anecdotes, The Making of a Milliner is also an excellent gift for craft enthusiasts, who are certain to delight in the process, tools, and fabrics of hat making. Jenny Pfanenstiel founded her company, Louisville, Kentucky's Formé Millinery, in 2007, and has designed hats for Oprah Winfrey, Michelle Obama, Barbara Corcoran, and Regina Taylor. Jenny's work has been featured in Vogue, Tatler, Country Living, Vigore, and Belle Armoire. She is the winner of the 2012 FGI Rising Star and both the 2009 and 2012 Hatty Awards.

A bespoke hat, designed with a particular event in mind, is something that many people long for but often feel is price prohibitive. In this fabulous new book, couture milliners, Lomax & Skinner, show that this need not be the case. clear and comprehensive step-by-step instructions and photography includes 12 very different hats for a variety of occasions, including a wood felt tribly, a chic pillbox, a fascinator and a feathered headband materials and equipment that are required are fully detailed, along with all the necessary techniques Full of inspirational and instructional photography, Millinery truly showcases this wonderful craft and provides all the know-how in order to achieve high-end, couture results at home.

Take basic sewing skills, add half a yard of fabric, and make one of 15 custom hats designed by an award-winning milliner. More than 250 illustrations guide you from drafting patterns to creating classic, head-turning hats. Start with a shirred beret, move on to a cloche, pillbox, or sailor hat.

Studies of millinery tend to focus on hats, rather than the extraordinarily skilled workers who create them. American Milliners and their World sets out to redress the balance, examining the position of the milliner in American society from the 18th to the 20th century. Concentrating on the struggle of female hat-makers to claim their social place, it investigates how they were influenced by changing attitudes towards women in the workplace. Drawing on diaries, etiquette books, trade journals and contemporary literature, Stewart illustrates how making hats became big business, but milliners' working conditions failed to improve. Taking the reader from the Industrial Revolution of the 1760s to the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and from Belle Epoque feathers to elegant cloches and Jackie Kennedy's pillbox hat, the book offers a new insight into the rise and fall of a fashionable industry. Beautifully illustrated and packed with original research, American Milliners and their World blends fashion history and anthropology to tell the forgotten stories of the women behind some of the most iconic hats of the last three centuries.

Since the recent royal wedding, couture hats and headpieces are gaining more attention than ever before. Featured on guests from Victoria Beckham to Sarah Ferguson’s daughter, Princess Beatrice, whimsical and sculptural hats are now splashed across the pages of fashion magazines, advertisements, and blogs. The trademark accessory of fashion muse Isabella Blow, couture hats were among the most talked about elements of the recent Alexander McQueen exhibit at the Met, and a Stephen Jones Couture Hats exhibition is running at Bard from September 2011 to April 2012. Couture Hats, a luscious gallery of modern fashion designs, will be unlike anything else on the market, artfully showcasing the most innovative work of master milliners around the world, including the likes of Stephen Jones, Philip Treacy, Anthony Peto, and Nasir Mazhar, designers who have all constructed numerous hats and headpieces for members and guests of the royal family, as well as celebrities like Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, and Daphne Guinness. Already endorsed by the creative director of Givenchy, each chapter of Couture Hats is devoted to a particular designer or design house, providing biographical information, professional philosophies, trade secrets, and intimate interviews. With hundreds of full-page, full-color photographs, these gorgeous modern hats include gravity-defying sculptural shapes to delight and inspire refined women, modern fashionistas, designers, students, aspiring milliners, and costume lovers. Even for those without the gall to wear such daring pieces, these hats will fascinate all creative minds. Among the designers included are: Philip Treacy for Alexander McQueen Philip Treacy Stephen Jones Noel Stewart House of Flora Heather Huey Tour de Force Àngel Coll Manuel Albarran Claudia Schulz Edwina Ibbotson Tolentino Haute Hats Charlie Le Mindu Simon Ekrelius Piers Atkinson Emma Yeo William Chambers Ellen Christine Anya Caliendo Dinu Bodiciu Gustavo Adolfo Tari Irene Bussemaker Dayna Pinkham

If you think you know what cross stitch is, look again! Jamie Chalmers, aka Mr X Stitch, shows you how to cross stitch using simple step-by-step instructions and also takes you to the frontiers of cross stitch design. The book is aimed at stitchers of all abilities, from absolute beginners looking to learn a new craft to embroiderers and cross stitchers who want to do something different in cross stitching. For many, cross stitch conjures up images of cute kittens and country cottages, but this book shows people that theres a different side to cross stitching that its an art in its own right, and will encourage them to be a little braver with their art. Jamies writing style is fun, entertaining and highly inspirational. The book aims to appeal to men as well as women, encouraging one and all to take up the ancient craft. It teaches the basics of cross stitching, including information on materials, tools, techniques and colour blending, but also puts Jamies own individual spin on it, with urban flavours and the introduction of different materials such as glow-in-the-dark threads and stitching on metal. As well as providing exciting designs to stitch, there is guidance on how to create cross stitch designs of your own, for example by using photographs and other images for reference. Jamie also showcases the work of other contemporary cross stitchers who are pushing the boundaries of their craft, and introduces more than 20 stunning cutting-edge projects to make, showing that beauty, innovation and 'craftivism' are alive and kicking in this inspirational book.

Hats finish an outfit; they make a statement, provide panache and lift your spirits. This book explains how to make your own hats, using traditional construction methods with both specialist millinery foundation materials and a range of fabrics and trimmings. It showcases twenty-six hats and headpieces, each with step-by-step photographs and instructions, some using ready-made elements, others that are made from scratch. Celebrating the versatility of hats, it introduces the wide range of styles and shapes that modern millinery has embraced. Explains the anatomy of the hat and how to fit a hat, and gives general millinery tips. Suggests sources of inspiration and design ideas. Introduces a range of hats and hat styles, from small, fun and fast headpieces to special occasion hats. Superbly illustrated with 534 colour step-by-step photographs.