Making a Mini Witch's Hat

I began with a bit of research on the subject, good old Google. That paired with what I already know about sewing helped me make this mini witch's hat.

For the sake of this project I decided to use a glue gun instead of sewing the seams. First of all, I'm not totally comfortable on a sewing machine. I hand sew with confidence, but the material I used was a thick PVC. It seemed silly to bother with seaming when the edges won't fray. It also seemed unnecessary to create a wire brim or other structural elements when the fabric I had was thick enough to hold its own without manipulation.

I used bowls from my kitchen as circular templates to create both the brim as well as the crown of the hat. A biggish soup bowl made a circle that I then cut a section from for the crown.

In the doodle on the right you can see that I cut a curve from the tip so that the two ends would join when rolled together. I also created a flap for the glue (seen at the top right of the right hand doodle) and at the bottom I created flaps to attach the cone, when created, to the brim. (Without the flaps there is no surface to attach to the brim; nowhere to place the glue. The bottom of the cone/form won't bend properly to meet the brim without this manipulation. It's difficult to explain, obvious when you're faced with the pieces.) 

I used a biggish soup bowl to create the brim. (Upper left). For all shapes I eyeballed and hoped for the best. Once the brim was cut, I loosely divided the circle to find the center, give or take. Next I used the cone's base (once dried) to trace a circle in the center of the brim. (Right and lower left). I then cut this circle from the brim. 

I then inserted the cone into the new hole and glued the flaps to the underside of the brim. 

(Ignore the trim, I wanted a shot of the underside to better illustrate how the pieces attach). 

Flipped over the hat looked like this. Pretty good without any embellishment, but I decided to hide the edges with the trim you saw above. 

To attach the trim I glued as I went and cut when it was clear that I had enough. If you look closely, you can see that I repeated the process where the cone's base meets the brim. 

For decoration I made a bow from a stiff mesh. Again, more eyeballing and a little scrunch created what I wanted. I used a twist tie to hold the shape and attached it to the hat with a squeeze of glue. 

To cover the twistee and add a little flair I made an owly friend from felt shapes. I'll toot my own horn here, I've always had a knack for simplifying visual elements for economy and clarity. Plus, I seem to have a decent image library in my head that allows for decent representations of animals and objects without research. That being said, I did Google owl designs after I got the body of this guy together. Why rely solely on my noggin, when I can pull together a little guy like this from several preexisting ideas.

Another squeeze of glue got him on the bow. 

Finally, I glued the whole thing to a $1.00 headband I got at a fabric store. 

All materials I either had on hand or bought as remnants except for the headband, but at a buck I think I did pretty well. Overall cost would be pretty damn low. The PVC was a little over $6 and I can get a bunch more of these guys from it, same with the mesh, but it was only a couple bucks. A sheet of felt is .23 cents. Glue guns and sticks are pretty affordable and last forever. The trim was $2.99 for a bag of assorted trims, including "dingle balls" that I really want to hang in my van. I think there were 6 trims, a yard each. 

Feel free to ask questions or make suggestions. :)