Each year, we put together a set of six costumes for as cheap as possible; for those who haven't seen my previous threads, here they are:
2009: Star Wars
2010: Lord of the Rings
2011: Batman
2012: Pirates of the Caribbean
This year's theme was "20th Century, Non fiction"... I thought we'd push the time barrier a little by going with "The End of the Old West" to make things interesting.
Unlike previous years, most of the costume pieces can be easily modified from everyday clothes. A few key pieces were missing, but the big thing we needed were hats. I had one generic wool hat that was semi-western, and I could borrow an Akurbra for one of the guys. I had a super-cheap sombrero from one of my kid's school projects and I found a couple of typical modern Stetson's for cheap on a local auction site. So, first to some hats:
One cheasy, bright red, silver trimmed sombrero:
I removed all the silver stuff, and cut 1/2" off the brim (to make it a little less exaggerated). I painted (yes, painted) the hat with a mixture of avocado green acrylic (to dull the bright red) and dark brown wood stain (to darken the color). I added an old black ribbon I removed from an old fedora, a brown piece of cloth around the base of the ribbon and finally an old shoe string for the chin-tie. Using steam, I reshaped the crown to a more authentic shape. Lastly, I dusted the entire sombrero with baby powder for a sweat-stained appearance:
Stetson #1 started like this:
One of our cowboys wanted a Tom Mix style crown, so I reshaped it to match using steam and added an off-white ribbon (not seen below, as I hadn't added it yet):
The other Stetson began it's life like this:
I reshaped this one based on some images I found on-line, toned down the brim curl a bit and added another ribbon off an old fedora (this one genuinely faded and sweat-stained). After adding baby powder for a dustier look:
After looking at this hat and wearing it several times over a few days, I decided it still looked to modern for my taste, so I completely reshaped the crown and flattened the brim for a more authentic period look:
More to come...
Kind regards,
Magnoli
2009: Star Wars
2010: Lord of the Rings
2011: Batman
2012: Pirates of the Caribbean
This year's theme was "20th Century, Non fiction"... I thought we'd push the time barrier a little by going with "The End of the Old West" to make things interesting.
Unlike previous years, most of the costume pieces can be easily modified from everyday clothes. A few key pieces were missing, but the big thing we needed were hats. I had one generic wool hat that was semi-western, and I could borrow an Akurbra for one of the guys. I had a super-cheap sombrero from one of my kid's school projects and I found a couple of typical modern Stetson's for cheap on a local auction site. So, first to some hats:
One cheasy, bright red, silver trimmed sombrero:
I removed all the silver stuff, and cut 1/2" off the brim (to make it a little less exaggerated). I painted (yes, painted) the hat with a mixture of avocado green acrylic (to dull the bright red) and dark brown wood stain (to darken the color). I added an old black ribbon I removed from an old fedora, a brown piece of cloth around the base of the ribbon and finally an old shoe string for the chin-tie. Using steam, I reshaped the crown to a more authentic shape. Lastly, I dusted the entire sombrero with baby powder for a sweat-stained appearance:
Stetson #1 started like this:
One of our cowboys wanted a Tom Mix style crown, so I reshaped it to match using steam and added an off-white ribbon (not seen below, as I hadn't added it yet):
The other Stetson began it's life like this:
I reshaped this one based on some images I found on-line, toned down the brim curl a bit and added another ribbon off an old fedora (this one genuinely faded and sweat-stained). After adding baby powder for a dustier look:
After looking at this hat and wearing it several times over a few days, I decided it still looked to modern for my taste, so I completely reshaped the crown and flattened the brim for a more authentic period look:
More to come...
Kind regards,
Magnoli
