Millinery: Telescopic puzzle block

[labricoleuse]

My assistant, Candy McClernan, pulled off an eBay coup on Thanksgiving Day when she won an auction for a telescopic puzzle block for only $50. If you watch hatblock auctions on there ever, you know that puzzle blocks of all styles usually end well into the $200-$300 range. I'd be absolutely green with envy if she weren't, you know, my assistant and friend, and willing to let me block on it!

So, want to see how it went? These kinds of blocks are exercises in spatial visualization, because the hat that they make looks different from the block itself.





Side view of block


Back view--see the nailhead denoting Center Back?
It leaves a divot in that bottom flange so the milliner knows
exactly where CB is when the hat comes off the block.


Top view of block--see those little oval stamps?
Those are guides to help you put the block back together correctly.


Felt hatbody on the block--grey felt screenprinted with a herringbone pattern.
You can get these and other printed felts at Hats By Leko.



These are called "telescopic" puzzle blocks because the hat as-blocked is sort of "exploded out" from its actual intended style. The dome crown section gets popped down inside the base section, to create a sort of nested effect, like the crown of a men's pork-pie hat. Here's a pic of the finished hat to show what i mean:


Back view, properly compressed


Front view, with 1920s-inspired ribbon garniture and vintage 1930s button.

Later this week, i'll post another series of pictures of the second hat we did on this block, showing exactly how it comes apart!

Comments

$50?!? Wow.

[ladycelia.livejournal.com]

Question for you: I have a really large headsize. Like, if I were a man, my hat size would be on the large side, for a woman, it's absurd. I tend to steer away from vintage blocks because they're designed for smaller head-sizes. Can you resize a hat like this? If so, about how much bigger is reasonable to expect?

I wear a mans 7 3/8" (I forget what it translates to in a womans size).

Re: $50?!? Wow.

[labricoleuse.livejournal.com]

7 3/8 is a 23" circumference.

This hat is designed to fit a range of headsizes, because the dome of the crown rests on your head and the outer shaped sideband part is quite large, like about a 24" circumference. (I think it's so you can do your hair in rolls or bouf it out a bit and have the hat not muss the style.) See how it stands away from the head in the finished shot, with about 1/2" worth of freespace all the way round?

So, probably wouldn't need to resize this one, but if it needed it, you *could* stretch it a bit; it might deform the undercut curve of the sideband a bit but would still be cute.

Re: $50?!? Wow.

[ladycelia.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the info. This helps a lot for those times when I see a totally cool block and talk myself out of it.

Re: $50?!? Wow.

[(Anonymous)]

I have a similar problem looking for blocks but my difficulty is most vintage blocks are all too big. I wear a 6 5/8 hat.

Candy

[purejuice.livejournal.com]

this rocks so very hard. thank you for showing the tool and the process, and congrats to candy.