A black pillbox with a circle of veil

How do you draw the line between inspiration and copying? Mine gets drawn by my imagination playing tricks on my memory.

I saw a hat in a movie that had a circle of veiling with a jewelled edge. In a fleeting moment, it was gone, and forgetting that I live in a century where I can rewind TV, I was stuck with just that concept in my brain. I knew also that I had seen UK milliner Bobbi Heath do some wired loops of veiling and other stuff, when I visited her for some tutoring in July, but I didn't go back to look at the images on her website.

I just played with the concepts I liked and focused on those. This is what I made.

I went with a simple pillbox shape (fabric over a buckram foundation) wrapped in veiling to keep the focus on the statement front of the hat.

I had a terrible time getting that veiling to stretch evenly across the circle! When I went back to look at my inspiration to see how others had managed to do it, I discovered I had really gone off on a very different path in some ways, and made these problems for myself.

We had such a fun photoshoot yesterday. Heaps of thanks to my model Sarah. Time for a windswept supermodel shot, Sez!

Photos of more new hats from this photoshoot soon!