Comic Inspired Fascinators and Headbands

This time let's get back into our comic groove with some hair candy for the ladies! WonderCon 2013 approaches, and if you volunteer or work there like me and can't be in costume the whole time, it's nice to show off a little of your nerdiness with either jewelry, clothes, or shoes. This year at Comikaze whilst volunteering over with my friends at SuperHeroStuff, I sported the Avengers logo in my hair, unfortunately, I lost it twice in a row o_o It wasn't too heart wrenching because it was only foam, glitter and hair clips.

I'm going to make a new one for WonderCon and side note: I will be cosplaying this year as...Viper! Oh yeah! I will of course be doing a blog post on that later. But for now let's grab some supplies and get to work!

You're going to need:

Craft Foam and/or Felt (you will need felt, but you can choose to use foam, fabric or more felt for the top layer)

Hair Clips (see the picture for the ones I used)

Glitter, Paint, rhinestones....whatever you want to use

Hot glue and glue to put on your embellishments if you have any

Scissors and/or x-acto blade

You'll want to map out the logo or design you want to use (If you'd like the simple starter shapes I used they are under the "Insert" tab on Microsoft Word.)

These are the templates I have used.

You need to think about how you want each section of it colored, what material you would use for that (glitter, paint, rhinestones, etc.) The simplest way I knew of was chunky glitter and glue, after cutting each piece of the logo out individually, glitter them, let them dry and then putting it all together. Rhinestones are tricky to get  all perfect and lined up. If you use  paint you have to be sure whatever material your painting on won't curl up as it dries, same goes for glitter glue.

I am going to start with the Avengers logo fascinator, and I will do it two different ways so you can choose whichever you prefer, or whichever you have the materials for...lets get crafty!

Start by taking your Avengers template (I printed mine out.) You will want to cut the base circle out of felt, and the blue layer out of foam, just place the template on the felt/foam, and trace the circle, then cut. Now take your template and cut out the The actual letter (this means you will have two pieces, a big a and the little triangle under the arrow.)

Be sure to cut it out carefully! If you are using glitter or paint, the foam color won't matter, however, as you'll see in a later photo, there is foam that is silver glitter already! If you use the glitter foam, you need to remember to pull the backing off before you glue it to the next layer.

Now you are going to take the base piece (felt layer) and lay your hair clip du jour on it so you can make your slits to hold it in place. See pictures:

Make lines about 1/4-1/2 inch from the ends of each side of the hair clip

Cut slits into felt to slide the hair clip through

end result = a layer you can slide a clip in and out of with ease

 If you are going to put paint, glitter, rhinestones, etc. on you will do that right now. I will be doing one with embellishments and one with just glitter foam. Here's how to get a good coating of glitter on plain craft foam:

Choose your colors and fineness for glitter and get some plain glue, a foam applicator brush and a paper plate

set up in a location where it is ok to make a mess

Squeeze a little glue onto the FRONT of your logo, then spread it evenly over the  face of the  logo.

Set it gently into the glitter glue side to glitter. Press down to get a nice even coat

Repeat with your background layer, then flip pieces right side up onto a towel to dry. Let them dry completely, do not rush!

 Next is to....ASSEMBLE ;) your fascinator. it is pretty much the same instructions no matter what design/shape you are using. You will want to hot glue your top layers together. For this fascinator that would be the A and the circle.

Flip it over so the backside is showing. Take your base layer with hair clip closed, top side up, like the photo...the one up there^
Now you will put a circle of hot glue around the edge of the backside of the logo, and sandwich it to the top side of the felt layer.

Be sure to steer clear of the area that would touch the hair clip remember you want to be able to slide it out! I don't suggest using glitter glue, it had already been loaded into the glue gun. just use clear!

Watch your fingers...this is where you could get burned :(

Well well...it looks like you have yourself a fascinating fascinator, surely it'll be the talk of the town, or at the very least your local comic store!

UPDATE: These four fascinators have been completed.