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Hair & Jewels
12-17-04: Saragrace thought that wig needed some more gewgaws, so we added a bit more stuff to it. I have to say, in the case of this ensemble, she is absolutely right: more is even better! Here are new (and hopefully final!) front and side shots.
12-13-04: Yay! The wig is all done! How strange for someone with as much hair as me to wear a wig... Anyway, here are shots from the front and side of the finished wig, with the big bird's egg pearls stuck in the roll. Pretty nifty, huh? Donna figured out how to set the pearls, which is in the third picture. Basically, I squish an old-timey hair pin so the end fits up into the hole drilled into the pearl. I put a little drop of glue in there for insurance. Then, to set pearls so they don't pop out if the wig, I bend a little foot up on one leg of the hairpin so the pin catches once inserted and can't be pulled out. Kind of like a drywall anchor, I guess!
12-1-04: Donna should be done with the wig this week, but while I was downloading the fan pics, I though I would show you the "bun covers" I gave to her for the back of the wig real quick. I found both of these on eBay. Donna felt that the gold one was too small for her purposes, too bad, so we will be going with the silver one, which expands, as you can see. So cool. I might have to steal this off the wig for me to wear after this is over!
11-17-04: Well, Donna took my portrait crops and went to town. I went in today for the first "draft" fitting. She wanted to make sure the wig base she constructed would fit before she went any further with the styling, which she has only taken the first pass at. Now that she knows it will fit to her satisfaction, she'll get down to that next. The way I understand it, she has created a base with 4 "different" hair attachments. The first is the rows of curls that will be over the brow, the next is the padded roll over the center of the crown, then there's the ground of the back, and last a separate bun attachment. All this is woven into a single wig. She has used these French mesh forms for the large center roll and the bun base. She also figured out how to use the pearls to great advantage. They are only top-drilled. I offered to drill them all the way through, but she said no. She has these funky old-timey hair-pins, that she squeezed real tight with pliers, and then inserted into the pearls, so she has a regular curl-pin base to work with. Very clever. Her comments on how she will proceed at this point are: she will be splitting out the front rows of curls so that there are at least three curls for every one you see now. She hasn't finished tucking in the sides and ends of the large roll yet, that's why it still has a bit of a colonial look to it yet. She wants to raise the back bun and the bulk of the back hair up more, as would be more similar to the portraits, but I have a jewelled bun cover coming for her that she may wait on. In the last picture, you can see all my hair hanging out from under the wig. She has instructed me to tape my hair while it's wet to get it as flat as possible (though she asked if I was considering a haircut before December!) and she has given me a fishnet wig cap to start getting used to as well, that I will have to wear under the wig. Pretty amazing for the first draft. She fiddled with the sides and back while it was on, and I could totally see how she's going to hit the silhouette dead on. She's a bit concerned about how the ruff is going to affect the back, so she's really trying to bring the back up as high and flat as possible.
11-10-04: Well, I ended up checking out a different wig place on Monday, and the lady there was extremely helpful and encouraging. Ms. Donna M. Connelly of Wigs Unlimited in Scottsdale has agreed to work with us on custom producing an already styled wig. Incredible! She does a lot of custom work for people who have lost their hair, and since she's been in business for an age, she apparently has a lot of surplus hair "remnants" that she can custom blend and put together for us, specifically to the style we want. The things one learns about other industries in this hobby... She says she enjoys theatrical work and doesn't get much of it these days. She'll do all this for a mention in the program or on the exhibit displays we'll put together after opening day, I can't believe it! I'm meeting with her in the morning with some pictures, and some samples of the pearls we will use. We're also supplying her with a professional head-form to my measure, SG had picked it up once she realized we actually have the same head size for us to do some millinery projects down the road. This is so exciting! I'm taking her the Armada and Ermine crops to work from.
11-3-04 later: Boy, I am getting a lot done today. Here are some picture crops of Elizabeth portraits that focus on the hair styles. I'm leaning towards the wider heart-shaped style that must be pulled over a hair form of some kind like the first and third crops from the second row, from the Armada and Ermine portraits. I think this wider style will look better with the dress, which has quite a presence. I figure too that with a form under the hair, I can stick the pearls right into the form on long pins, and perhaps get them to stay in one place fairly well. Hm, this reminds me of the wulste work from the Nuremberg Dress...
I also have a picture of some of the pearl drop sizes I have accumulated. The fat ones on the left are as big as bird's eggs! I have to find a way to use them!
11-3-04: I'll need to post some pictures of hairstyles I'm looking at, but I wanted to report that I met with my wedding hairdresser for some advice last week. She took one look at the even longer length of my hair, and said, "Wig. Get a wig." She advises a shoulder length red bob, of real human hair so she can style it, and she told me about some padded shapes and forms I can get from Sally's Beauty Supplies that will add the top dimensions that I'll be trying emulate. To be honest, I'm glad to go with a wig, styling the hair was going to be a pain for the "fashion show" that the library wants. Now there will be "hair" that we can display with the gown for the exhibit on the dress itself that they are planning. I think it will be easier to manage the hair jewels this way, too. So I have one wig store I'll be checking out tomorrow, but I suspect that I will be going back to good ole' eBay for my final purchase!
I'm just a little freaked out at the thought of wearing a wig of someone else's hair, though.