A Mad Hatter

For years I've wanted to make costumes for the various Alice in Wonderland characters.  A few years ago I made an Alice, in the traditional style, but I also wanted to make the Mad Hatter and Red Queen from the Johnny Dep movie.  Well, this past October I finally made a Mad Hatter outfit.

I couldn't decide on whether to make it MSD size so he'd be more accurately scaled to Alice, but in the end went for KID size, so it could be used as a Halloween costume in the future. I started out with Milo as my model, but didn't really like him in the role, so switched to David....

It was a complicated outfit, made up of many parts. I decided to make the shirt and vest in one piece to help reduce bulk. I bought a couple of packages of tiny wooden spools, painted them, then drew lines on them with matching coloured pencil crayons to simulate 'thread'.  The hat was the most challenging, since the doll already had such a big head and I didn't want it to be HUGE.  I made a red mohair wig on a crocheted cap, which I glued into the hat.  

So of course, once the costume was done, I wanted to shoot a Mad Hatter's Tea Party.  It would be a complex set requiring several tables, lots of chairs, and lots of food and dishes.  

​In those situations I always set up the scene inside so I know exactly what I need to bring outside.  It's a good thing too, since the three tables didn't have enough space to accommodate the cakes I originally chose.  

​The basic scene set up on the kitchen table. The only real 'Alice' characters I had were Alice, a Mad Hatter, and some mice, so I just substituted various other characters. After all, who says that the Tea Party depicted in the book and movie was the only one they ever had???

Once I had a decent table layout, I moved all the props onto a tray, all in the same position,  so I'd know how to lay them back on the tables outside....

The scene would need a much wider space than usual, so Jan carried an old counter-top outside and laid it on the patio table, which had been moved down to the grass.... 

It was the day before Halloween, and I took lots of photos, but time kept flying, and I had all kinds of other pressing things to do, so a whole month has gone by, and I'm finally getting to posting the photos.   So, stay tuned.....