D.I.Y. wedding accessory

This is the finished article! My much sought-after netting finally arrived and was the finishing touch to this fascinator. I was determined to make it myself, and I did!

Fascinator in blue (above) and burgundy (below) settings. My hair is platinum blonde at the moment, so the base of the piece will blend in, with any luck.

[Images my own. Please ask before reproducing].

So, my crafting project for Operation Wedding has come to fruition and here are some images to give you an idea of how it all went. I opted for a straw fascinator base, although you can get fabric-covered versions, but I was drawn to the straw because it has more of that vintage feel. I wanted feathers, but found that a lot of the high street hairpieces were completely covered or were full of these fussy, pokey things that stuck out a mile away. My fascinator needed to be fashion-led (it's an LCF alumnus getting married), classy (it's not a night clubbing) and a bit eclectic (it's me who's wearing it). Hopefully I've achieved that with the addition of flat peacock feathers, turquoise feathers, black fabric bands and black birdcage netting.

Method for 1 wedding fascinator:

• Take your base (which can be bought easily online, or from craft shops such as C&H Fabrics, where I found this straw number for £2.79) and decide how you want to arrange the decorations on top.
• Sew some black fabric bands onto your chosen base, to emphasise the direction of the feathers and add a bit of a background, effectively meaning you can add colour between those lines. I created a 'V' shape with two black strips arranged across the circular base.
• Attach the netting onto the back of the base using a simple running stitch or even some PVA glue, remembering to try it on your head to see how much or how little netting you want to use. It's nice to try and shade one eye slightly with the coverage, giving a retro feel.
• On the back of the base, attach a bridal/crafting comb (again, from internet suppliers or C&H Fabrics), which has a loop on each 'finger' of the comb that you can sew into. By catching those loops in your running stitch, you keep the comb close to the base and it should feel fairly solid. Remember that the direction of the comb dictates how you can fix it to your hair - the top of the comb should adhere to the top part of the design on the other side!
  
• Sew, glue or clip on feathers and other appropriate decorations. You might want to add bridal hair pieces such as pearls on wire, or maybe some fake flowers. For an easy approach, grab some cheap hair accessories featuring flowers, gemstones or feathers from H&M or Primark and affix them wherever you want. If you've used a loose running stitch to put the fabric band on, you can tuck feathers into the gaps between the stitches and they should stay put.
  
• Voila! A slightly ostentatious but very unique fascinator that you can remodel for future occasions.