Hats and the theatre

The April meeting of Woodhouse Eaves WI began with our President, Brenda Chance, giving us details of an impressive number of activities lined up for the next few months - coffee mornings, book club meetings, walks, skittles matches, darts matches, an outing and a garden party were all included.  Hats off to the hardworking members who organise these events!

We then sat back to enjoy a fascinating talk by theatrical milliner Shirley Whitfield, who described how she started art studies at the Ealing Art School in London at the age of 13.  She eventually specialised in dress design, which included pattern cutting, flower making, millinery and theatrical design. After leaving art school Shirley’s first job was at L & H Nathans in London, established in 1790, one of only five theatrical design companies in London at the time.  There she learned how to make beautiful costumes, how to knot and trim wigs and finally how to create hats.

By the age of 18 Shirley was head of the millinery department.  One of her earliest challenges was to make the 74 hats required for the film Richard III, starring Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud.  Then came the Queen’s coronation, and Shirley produced the riding hats for the postilions and 17 of the 24 pages’ hats.  An additional job was to replace the worn-out ermine on the coronets with rabbit skin! The peers of the realm were not informed of the change…Shirley wanted to share her excitement at being involved with the preparations for the coronation with her mother, so she put one of the coronets in a brown paper bag and took it home with her on the Tube!

After working on many well-known productions such as Beau Brummel (starring Stewart Granger), Gilbert & Sullivan’s Princess Ida and several Covent Garden operas where Shirley met some of the great opera singers of the day, Shirley’s family moved to Nottingham.  She continued working for Nathans for a time, but it proved impractical.  After a short period as a dress designer for a bridalwear company, Shirley jumped at the chance to become Assistant Wardrobe Manager at Nottingham Playhouse.

Shirley described in detail some of the materials and techniques used in making theatrical costumes and, in particular, hats. To demonstrate her workmanship Shirley showed us a selection of hats she had created for various productions, all exquisitely shaped and trimmed.  She explained that the basic hat was generally made from a material which, when wet, could be shaped and moulded.  Flowers, feathers and other trimmings would be stitched on to wire and then the wire stitched to the hat.  Very big hats, such as those worn by pantomime dames, would be fixed to the wig which would itself be fixed to a wire frame – all for the hat to stay in place.

A top tip from Shirley – if your children or grandchildren ask you to make a hat for them, use foam rubber as a base and butt joint the pieces.  Then cover the foam with fabric and trim as necessary.  Much easier than using cardboard!

At the end of the talk we enjoyed examining the hats Shirley had created and trying them on...