Tag Archives: costume headdress

Ice Queen Crown made of Trash!

Ice Queen Crown on pillows by Suzanne Forbes March 2020Well, not entirely of trash, but there’s some trash in there!

No new materials purchased to make this crown for a fabulous Snow Queen or Winter Witch except the headband base. Yeah, it’s not exactly seasonal, but I had a lot of pretty snow and ice materials around from the Snow Queen projects of years ago. And besides, this is one of the projects I’m gonna raffle or donate for queer community fundraisers when quarantine is over, so maybe it won’t even be out in public for months!

Ice Queen Crown center by Suzanne Forbes March 2020Sometimes another artist’s creative work hits me so hard it haunts me (benevolently) for years.

Such was the case with Nifer’s Gashlycrumb Tinies costume for the Edwardian Ball in 2009. Her genius in creating the costume for Winnie, Embedded in Ice, was so great that I can see it in my mind’s eye like a photograph any time I want. I always wanted to do something icy like that, with transparent and glitter frosted materials. Finally, last month, I did!

Ice Queen Crown detail 2 by Suzanne Forbes March 2020The frontispiece of this headpiece is a piece of flexible plastic from a box or something, cut into curving, wavelike shapes along the top.

Then I used my finger to smear interference paint (the same interference paint, once I get going with a material I keep going!) on the back, and then I dusted lavender-blue micro-glitter over the wet paint.

Ice Queen Crown WIP 2 by Suzanne Forbes March 2020Once the paint on the back was dry, I glued the plastic strip to the wide blue headband I had already built out with plastic icicles and blue glitter vinyl spikes. Then I decorated the curved top edge of the plastic with opalescent and iridescent crystals and beads.

I had saved the plastic bags the PVA for my 3D printing pen came in. They were slightly cloudy and had a rounded shape from holding the coils of PVA filament. I cut them into round tabs, gathered the tabs at their bases with wire, smeared interference paint on them, and dredged them in glitter.

I also did some ombre business with silver and teal microbeads! I love microbeads, which are also easily found under the name “nail art caviar beads”!

Ice Queen Crown fans WIP by Suzanne Forbes March 2020And I made some little curliques of beads on wire, cause why not. And tucked some tufts of that galaxy tulle in the fans as well. You can see a little video of me dredging them in glitter here.

Haven’t you always wanted to be DREDGED IN GLITTER?

Actually, I know you – you have been!

Ice Queen Crown outside by Suzanne Forbes March 2020So I gluegunned the plastic fans on, and added resin snowflakes and a swirl of silver wired ribbon at the front and poufs of a different silver wired ribbon at the back. I am gonna use up this Snow Queen stuff  at some point!Ice Queen Crown on Suzanne Forbes March 2020

Fairy Unicorn Rainbow Headband, what silliness!

Holographic glitter vinyl pvc unicorn fairy headdress by Suzanne Forbes February 2020I made this ridiculous rainbow glitter iridescent PVC headpiece so impulsively!

I saw the iridescent headband lying on a shelf in the bathroom just after I’d been admiring some holographic vinyl fetishwear on Instagram. I remembered I had some small sheets of glitter and holographic pvc I ordered as samples in my “sparkle” drawer. I grabbed those out, turned on the glue gun, and started cutting shapes out of the pvc without any pattern, plan or design whatsoever.

Holographic glitter vinyl pvc unicorn fairy headdress by Suzanne Forbes February 2020I had a vague idea I could fold or pleat the vinyl to make fans, and it turned out that was possible.

Holographic glitter vinyl pvc unicorn fairy headdress by Suzanne Forbes February 2020Intriguingly, the pvc could also be manipulated to create curving dimples around the folds. I made some fans and then poked a hole through their bases so I could use wire to secure the pleats as well as create an attachment.

I used my Tack Life mini-dremel to drill three holes in the headband, ran wires through the holes in the plastic icicles, and wired them on, then glue-gunned them stable.

Then I added the fans around them, using their wires and then the glue gun.

It actually worked!

After one has been making stuff for long enough, an invisible DOS of How to Make Stuff just runs in the brain.

I tried to take photos but I am so bad at that, so I made a bad drawing of how I did it!

Vinyl fan how to by Suzanne Forbes Feb 24 2020I was moving so fast I just grabbed a used emery board off the desk top to make a stem or handle for the bigger fans.

I snapped it in half and stuck it between the pleats, then wire wrapped it, which facilitated attaching the pleats to the headband. I used the gluegun almost exclusively for construction, which is bad because glue gun glue is heavy! But I love how fast it is.

Holographic glitter vinyl pvc unicorn fairy headdress by Suzanne Forbes February 2020 detailI did use my UHU alleskleber to attach miniature braid around the edges of each fan, which gave a nice finish.

And I used the Alleskleber to attach the various iridescent and rainbow shift rhinestones. I glittered the silk flowers by swabbing them (literally, rather than using a brush I just grabbed a Q-Tip) with Interference Paint in blue-violet, then dipping them in lavender micro-glitter.

Holographic glitter vinyl pvc unicorn fairy headdress by Suzanne Forbes February 2020 leftThe poufs of glitter tulle and color-shift organza are stuffed with holographic plastic Easter grass I had had since at least the late ’90s.

I can’t believe I finally used it!!! I just secured each stuffed pouf with wire at the bottom to make an enclosed bundle, then gluegunned that on.

All in, this project still took me a good ten-twelve hours. But imagine how long it would have taken if I had thought about it first or made some kind of plan for it! That probably would have added hours! Better to just dive in, for me 🙂