How to make a pirate hat


The material I used was called "Fun Foam" from Hobbycraft It was only available in A3 sheets in the colours I wanted, but they did offer selection packs of larger sheets.

The hardest part of the whole thing is getting the hole in the brim to have the same circumference as the crown. I resorted to a 3D cad system after measuring my head (which I did by trapping it in a sliding door (gently) and using a ruler :-) You can download a pdf file here. Print it at 100% for a 60cm hat. Scale for a larger or smaller head.

Mark and cut out 6 crown segments as shown here

Take two segments and place them under the foot of a sewing machine set to wide zig-zag. Make sure the edges are touching and start with the needle 10mm from the pointed ends with the blunt ends towards you.

Start off in reverse and stitch right to the points, then switch to forwards and sew the whole seam. At the end reverse for another 10mm.

You should end up with something like this.(I used a contrasting thread to make it clearer).

Now attach a third segment to the first two being especially careful to align the points exactly. If you don't you will end up with a hole in the middle of the crown.

Then sew together a second group of three segments. Doing it this way means that the final seam is a straight line...

You might be tempted to start at one edge and stitch right through, but I found it better to carefully align the points and to sew from the centre outwards twice.

The sheets of foam I had were too small to make a hat brim of suitably gigantic cartoony proportions so I zig-zag stitched them together edge to edge

Now use the supplied template to cut a hole out of the middle of the brim. There are marking notches in the pattern to help with centering, but for some hat designs you might not want the crown exactly in the middle.

Stitching the crown into the brim is probably the hardest part of the whole procedure.

With the crown on top of the brim, with the edge of each pointing to the right stitch through both layers 5mm from the edges.

Now fold the seam up inside and zig-zag it flat as shown. You should end up with an odd square hat like this

Now cut off one corner

Then use the corner cut off as a template for the other three to assure symmetry

To hold a proper piratey shape, be it bicorne, tricorne, captains or savvy the edge needs wiring. I used the earth core from some 1.5mm2 lighting cable

If you hold one end of the wire in a vice (or use a glamourous assistant with pliers) and pull very hard until you feel the wire stretch it will end up dead straight and a little harder

Zig-Zag stitch the wire to the brim of the hat. Be careful not to try to stitch through the wire, it won't work. overlap the wire for about 25mm somewhere less likely to show.

Now is time to bind the edge. On my first attempt I used ribbon. Even after ironing a crease down the middle it was a bit of a disaster as it won't lie flat on the curves. The stuff to use is called Bias Binding which comes pre-creased and is cut on the diagonal so it has some stretch to it. This makes it much easier to bind the edges.

And there is is, a finished hat modelled by the lovely Demeter. I got the ostrich plume from Carnmeal

By the third hat I could knock them out in a bit under an hour without trying too hard.