The Parasol of Doom

Almost a year ago, I started putting a costume together for the then upcoming convention, Wild Wild West Con. I hadn't been to a convention in years. (I think my last one was at the Camelot Hotel in Tulsa. As a lady does not reveal her age, I will leave it at that.) I was particularly excited for the Wild West Con because it was a Steampunk themed convention. I have been quite the fan of Steampunk as a literary genre for many years and had apparently been living under a cultural rock. Until that moment, I had no idea that there was such a thriving Steampunk community in my own state. I was most certainly inspired to construct what I hoped would be a wonderful costume!

Not being at all practical, I started with my accessories because the projects amused me and because they were easy to start and finish. I had chanced upon a wonderful blog called The Steamwench's Salon. There, our hostess and writer, had posted a wonderful parasol project. Utterly delighted by what she created, I decided to make my own. I had in my possession a beautiful vintage umbrella given to me by my dear friend, Mrs. Fuzzy. The umbrella was starting to look a little the worse for wear and I thought a make-over would really be in order. Beyond that, the handle was just so fabulous that I rather thought the canopy ought to better coordinate.

The Steamwench actually does employ her sewing machine in her project to create excellent results, but I, being the lazy creature that I am, decided there had to be some easier way to make my own parasol project. Accordingly, almost everything is glued on using Fabri-Tac.

I started by outlining the ribs with a dark brown woven upholstery cord. I tried to make the ends as neat as possible and get them as close to the metal point at the top of the canopy as I could. I had already decided that I would cover the top with some sort or decoration. My initial plan was that I would make a gathered ribbon cockade that I could wrap around the metal tip. Right away I discovered that it was quite a challenge to lay the line of glue without it running along the curve of the canopy.

Thanks to my cleverengineer husband, I ended up with a ironing board drawn up to my work surface to make a place where I could balance the parasol level to the floor. This way the glue ran down along the straight of the rib making for a cleaner process.





Fortunately, I had been warned in advance thanks to the wonderful work of the Steamwench. I knew that I needed to plan for some sort of closure for my parasol. On the last rib, I added a length of the same braided cord to serve as a snap closure for the parasol. I glued it down trying to make sure that the unfinished end was covered by the rib trim. I planned to sew on the snaps later.
My initial plan was to find some pretty velvet ribbon and the box please some grosgrain or something else lovely underneath it as the trim along the canopy edge. Lucky, lucky me, I found this most excellent trim at the shop that already had some lovely pleats under a velvet ribbon. This was also felicitous because I could not find any velvet ribbon on its own that I liked. Plenty of pink and white -- which would not do! -- but no brown or green or amber or... well any color that I liked for this project.

Now it was time to trim around the central spike. I made my gathered ribbon but when I added it to the canopy, even though it nicely concealed the raw ends of the rib trim, I thought it looked rather unfinished. After consulting with my dear husband, I found that he agreed with me and the search was on for something to top things off. We thought a bead of some sort might work or perhaps a little piece of metal filigree. We spent a couple of weeks searching for the thing. My husband was once again to the rescue as he found a really interesting wooden, well, bead for lack of a better word. It had just the right amount of curve to it so that it fit nicely flush when the canopy of the parasol was open.

Open final inspection, I decided my parasol needed one last finishing touch. On the search I went again. I looked through my stash of beads, ribbons, buttons, and broken jewelry. Nothing quite suited what I envisioned. It was while looking for buttons to complete another project that I spotted just the thing: little brown velvet ribbon flowers with a small beaded center. I procured just enough to sew one to the point of each rib at the edge of the canopy.

I was quite happy with the over all look and knew that if nothing else, I could protect my fair skin in style. Also, I felt certain that, if any ruffians tried to assault me, I could certainly beat them off with my very stylish parasol without fear of losing too much trim. It was also a wonderfully simple project that took only a few hours of time to actually make. There were quite a few more hours involved waiting for glue to dry and searching for just the right something to finish off the project. The only sewing I had to do was very simple hand work.



Here is a final view of the parasol extended. As you look, you might notice that this is the not quite finished parasol, but I think it gives a nice view of the overall effect. Alas, I have as yet had no opportunity to brandish the parasol at any scoundrels but I have used it on several occasions for rather excellent sun protection.

~La Cucitrice