Hair Wear

Over the past few months I have made lots of stretch velvet clothing as loungewear. For example my various pairs of stretch velvet joggers, dresses, tops and leggings and my glittery sweatshirt dress in my last 10 or so blog posts. As you can guess this has produced lots of offcuts. Some are still useable for other things like colour blocking in tops - which I have yet to explore - but some are very narrow like the edges of the selvedges and I decided to make lots of new hair wear. 

 

Is that a term? Hair wear? 

Well maybe I just invented something. Somehow I doubt it, but who knows?

So I have been making loads of hair bands. I made one in green velvet a year back now from the Rebecca Page Hair band pattern and its the very first version ever to fit me and actually look like a store bought hair band.  I never actually blogged about it then, but was more interested in my gloves and jumper but its been a great success and worn loads. I search very hard when I lose this in my wardrobe because I find I really rely on this when working hard and my hair is annoying me at the PC, so I decided its time I get round to taking time out for some lighter (practical!) sewing and make more of these but in different thicknesses or widths is probably the correct word.

 

I still used the basic band though from the RP pattern, but RP has 3 versions including a twisted one and one with a bow so its worth experimenting in the future maybe. For now these are perfect for me. I can wear all of these whe in work meetings without being too OTT. I did make several different widths - mainly to fit the available fabric pieces and with more vairety than the RP band pattern shows but its an easy adjust and takes zero skill to change the width really. And having this pattern makes making hair bands so very easy. I have stacks of old hair bands made from pieces of nice fabric thats just tied in a  knot and I do really like some of these so they are not being chucked out any time soon, but these sewn ones are like real RTW hairbands - as in finished and I could even sell these. Not that I want to sell them. I intend to wear them for the next year or so. 

I actually got an email from a blogger recently about making hair bands but the RP ones unlike most I have found online are made so that all you have to hand sew is a tiny hole where you turn them. You sew the long side then turn back on itself and sew most of the hole - so you sew the two sides of the tube with a machine / overlocker and you get this really neat hairband. Its not just sewn along the short side and the rough endes hopefully not seen. There are NO rough edges in sight. The only bad bit is I am so rubbish at neatly hand sewing them up!

This is a typical messy hand sewn bit. Still better than having raw edges tho!

You actually sew the join with the machine with the tube tucked inside itself and just hand sew about a cm or so- so its possible to pull it back to the right side - and depending on how good you get at making these the hole seems to get smaller the more I make - and more practice I get making them.

Eventually this pile will probably get lost into my wardrobe or the airing cupboard but for now I have all these:

I am happy! 

Its the sort of collection I used to buy cheap in January sales but these cost me a few hours over a few weeks to make and no money at all! They are totally made from scraps and really could be made from old worn out clothing as well. Personally I still have a large amount of stashed scraps to get used up.

Burgundy velvet head band - matches my dress and trousers

That dress has been altered twice since the original posts but more on that later maybe.

Then there is my slightly narrower green hair band. This is the same velvet as the wider band above and is because after a whole year of wear this has been well used I decided to make a second narrower version. Narrower is easier to wear and I find the first one is mostly worn folded to make it narrower so now I have a simple narrow green band as well.

Its still quite wide unless you compare with the original one:

As you can see there is actually a lot of difference in the width and that changes how it can be worn.

Blue and red tartan - currently making a dress from this fabric which has yet to be hemmed.

I love this lilac colour which is the same as my "Abba" tracksuit.

I need to make another in lilac I think. Its a colour I wear a lot at the moment.

Grey glittery sweatshirt fabric - does contain lycra so should work well I thik and is the only one that is not velvet! If made from bits left over from hoody grey glittery my dress and again might make another of these. This is the first one I made ( this year) and caused the sudden hair band frenzy!

I am not good at selfies!

Glittery black velvet left over from my trousers I made for the Christmas holiday

I particularly like the red velvet one which I actually found needed to be smaller than the others possibly because its more stretchy material but they are all good. The other one I keep wearing is the grey glitter sweatshirt fabric version. That needed to be bigger due to the fabric being a bit less stretchy but it still works. Although here the red looks very similar to the aubergine there is quite a difference in colour in real life.

Anyway, the RP pattern is really good if you wanted to make these but really not needed. The secret is to sew a tube then turn it inside itself and sew as far round the two ends as you can, then turn right side out and hand sew up the hole you pulled it through. Without the RP pattern I never realised thats how its done but its so easy once you know how.

I also made another scrunchie but this time just the one. 

I still have lots of these sewn into tubes ready for the elastic from the last time I made this kind of thing so the scrunchie was really fast and easy  just needing to be finished really. I can make more when I need them. In fact I should probably get round to finishing the pile I have stored with my sewing stuff. Having half made hair wear though is very useful like when you eg. need a scruchie in the next few minutes. I even wore one for a couple of days without sewing it together and just with the elastic holding it together. It works for the short term if you are busy and need one though.

This project was a nice change from the more difficult sewing I usually do I have to say. I feel like I got loads for the time I spent sewing. At least my original single hairband is now lots - in all colours. 

And I actually got rid of lots of scraps from my stash. One thing though about these hairbands is it kind of proves that it really IS worth keeping all those selvedges and small offcuts after all, despite what other people will say to you about clutter. 

Ha!

Have a great weekend and thanks so much for popping by,

Bracken