Let's Craft Something!

A few years ago, I was introduced to the wonderful world of steampunk.  If you haven't heard of it before, there are a multitude of resources on it; I would suggest a Google Image search just to give you the basic idea.  To explain it initially to confused individuals, I would begin with "neo-Victorian."  Another suggested it simply as "What if the future happened in the past."  I've heard prime examples of it described as the film Wild Wild West or The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (I realize it was a book before being made into a film, but we live in an age where films have a wider audience, unfortunately).  We were introduced to it during Anime Weekend Atlanta, where we attended a panel by Outland Armour.  These guys do an amazing job with everything they put their hands on.  It is definitely worth a look if you haven't seen their work before.

During our last AWA trip, I saw this beautiful top hat that I thought would look amazing on my boyfriend.  What I didn't realize, however, was the price.  It was a beautiful leather top hat in green and brown.  I even made him try it on.  In the end, though, it wasn't worth the $250 and we went home without it.


One day, I was skimming through new craft websites, as I am prone to do, and stumbled across Cut Out and Keep.  I did a search for steampunk out of curiosity and ran across a tutorial for a Duct Tape steampunk top hat.  Her finished product is shown below along with a different version that followed the same pattern:


It's beautiful, but at the same time, it is much too feminine for him.  It also used a preexisting top hat, which we didn't have.  It mentioned using a plastic party top hat that could be purchased from somewhere like Party City, but I didn't want to make the trip and risk making a hat that was too small for his head.  I also didn't like the lines where the Duct Tape began and ended being so visible as it is in the original product.

I did some searching and found a few YouTube tutorials on making a Duct Tape top hat from scratch -- well, Duct Tape.  My best find was a Dr. Seuss Cat in the Hat top hat tutorial found here.

After looking through the tutorials and watching the video, I decided it was due time I began.  When I finally stopped procrastinating, I got it done in time for Christmas.