I was recently commissioned by the Fashion Museum Bath to create two stylised wigs for use with their mannequins in various photography projects. It is a wonderful opportunity to work on something sculptural and textile-based, while drawing on many of the same principles I use in creating my fine bindings: patience, precision, an understanding of materials, and the ability to make something both beautiful and yet robust enough for display.
In April 2026 I met with Fleur Johnson, the museum’s Collections Manager, to discuss her requirements. The brief was to develop versatile hairstyles for photography that would complement both clothing on mannequins and various types of headwear. Since dramatic evening wear can often appear incomplete on hairless mannequins, and hats frequently lose their shape without hair styled beneath them, the aim was to create wigs to add visual interest while showcasing the museum’s archive of hats and clothing.
The two selected styles were a classic low bun (see below) and a versatile half-up, half-down look, with one in off-white and the other in black. These were inspired by two contemporary wigs I created in 2025 for the Marie Antoinette Style exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum.
The Fashion Museum Bath is currently temporarily closed as it undergoes a major relocation project. It is scheduled to reopen to the public in December 2030 in its brand‑new home at the historic, Grade II-listed Old Post Office building on New Bond Street in the centre of Bath. The museum’s internationally renowned archive of roughly 100,000 fashion artefacts, spanning 400 years of history, is currently being safely stored and maintained at the Dents headquarters in Warminster. Dents is a historic British heritage fashion brand, widely recognised as one of the world’s premier luxury glove makers. Founded in 1777 by John Dent in Worcester, the company moved its operations to Warminster, Wiltshire, in 1937. Today, its spacious, high-security modern headquarters doubles as the temporary climate-controlled archive housing the Fashion Museum Bath’s collection during its relocation.
In this write-up I am documenting the construction process of these two wigs which is a complex task given crinoline’s unique properties and hope that I am able to share some of the techniques used to create these pieces. Whilst I did strive to take work in progress images whilst working on this project, it has been hard to edit the images as they all look so similar when you get down to the details!
THE BRIEF AND PROCESS
Since the museum uses a variety of mannequins to display its collections, the brief required adaptable frames that could accommodate different head sizes. Measurements taken on-site showed that the most commonly used mannequin heads had a circumference of 54 cm above the ears, so I scaled this up to 56cm as the measurement I would work to. I planned to add an elastic strap and catch into the inner frames to allow for further size adjustment of the finished wigs.
Crinoline is a fascinating material to work with. It has body and movement, but it can also be shaped, layered, gathered, and manipulated in quite expressive ways. For wig-making, those qualities are incredibly useful. It allows you to create volume without too much weight, which is important when something needs to be worn, styled, mounted, or displayed. The challenge is in controlling it. Crinoline wants to spring, curve, twist, and create it’s own shapes which is part of its charm. When working with this material, the process involves a lot of testing: how it behaves when gathered, how can it be stitched in place, how it responds to being layered, and how to build a hairstyle while keeping the overall feel light and elegant.
THE FRAMES
Every good wig starts with a solid base frame that I can build the style on. For both of the wigs I used Rigilene boning which is a lightweight, flexible dressmaking material made from woven polyester. It is often used to provide shape, structure, and vertical support to garments like strapless dresses, bridal gowns, swimwear, and costumes. Unlike traditional steel or hard plastic boning, its unique woven structure allows you to sew directly through it by hand or machine without needing a separate fabric channel or casing. In the case of these wigs, I predrilled holes in the Rigilene using a Dremel to save my fingers pushing a needle through multiple layers of the material.
The following steps show how the Riglilene frames were created. For the black wig I used black boning, and clear for the ivory wig, although the photographs show a mixture of both in the construction stages.
THE ASSEMBLY OF THE FRAMES
- Form the Base: Create a rigilene band with a 56cm diameter. Drill holes (with a Dremel) and stitch the material together where the ends overlap with thread.
- Construct the Frame: Sew a rigilene strip from the front to the back of the band. Add a second strip running from side to side, sewing it first to the central intersection and then down onto the sides of the base band.
- Prepare the Netting: Cut two lengths of doubled netting. Gather and twist the netting at the centre, then sew it onto the upper cross-section of the Rigilene frame. Repeat this process with a second layer of netting, to lay at 90 degrees across the first layer.
- Position the Netting: Push the loose ends of the netting down under the base band, fold them around the frame and secure them with pegs around the whole circumference.
- Final Stitching: Use a blanket stitch to fix the netting around the entire circumference of the band. To finish, gather the remaining ends of the netting at the crown and secure them firmly with thread.
BUILDING UP THE STYLES
Once the frames were ready it was time to start adding the crinoline layers to create the two distinct hairstyles. What I enjoy about this kind of making is that it requires problem-solving at every stage. There is always a conversation between the idea, the material and the final look of the object. Each wig began with establishing the overall silhouette, then gradually building up volume and texture. Crinoline can create very bold shapes, but it also allows for soft, delicate details, so I spent time balancing those two qualities.
The crinoline I used for these two wigs was sourced from Petershams Millinery Supplies which is an internationally renowned British supplier specialising in vintage hat-making materials and modern millinery components. I ordered 32 meter bolts of their “15cm (6 inch) Wide Crinoline” in both ivory and black. When you order bolts of wide flat crinoline (also known as horsehair braid) it arrives as one continuous, long piece rather than being chopped into separate 1-metre sections. To preserve the flexibility of the material without creating permanent creases, it is gently wound or lightly coiled inside its box with a gathering thread.
For the purpose of the instructions below:
- The “lengths” I refer to are the length of the crinoline bolt before being unravelled.
- When I say “tied over the ends”, I am referring to the fact that for all the cut ends of crinoline in the wigs, I fold them over on themselves and stitch the ends to prevent fraying of the material.
MAKING THE “LOW BUN” WIG
First layer of crinoline, part one (pictured below):
I cut two lengths of black crinoline and folded it in half. I tied over the ends and secured with thread. I pinned and sewed the central folded section to the outer edge of the front of the frame. I then secured the tied together end to the middle back of the frame.
First layer of crinoline, part two (pictured below):
I cut two lengths of black crinoline and folded it in half. I tied over the ends and secured with thread and repeated so I had two identical pieces like this. I attached these pieces sideways, with the long edge pinned and sewn to the outer edge of the frame. The wide end of these pieces was hooked under the first layer of crinoline at the front of the wig, added in the previous step. The tied over ends were secured at the centre back of the frame.
I then tidied up the first layer of crinoline with small stitches to create a sleeker base layer. I used long hat pins to hold the crinoline in place as a added the stitches.
Second layer of crinoline, part one (pictured below):
I cut two lengths of black crinoline and folded it in half. I tied over the ends and secured with thread and repeated so I had two identical pieces like this. I attached these pieces sideways, with the long edge pinned and sewn to the outer edge of the frame. Half way along the length, the edge of this piece was folded around and under the frame (about centrally along the length), with the rest sewn inside the frame – including the tied over ends. I pegged the pieces in place to hold them in position before securing with thread.
Second layer of crinoline, part two (pictured below):
I cut two lengths of black crinoline and twisted it in half. I attached the twisted part inside the frame at the very front. The two strips of crinoline were individually tied over and secured down across the head and stitched down at the back where they naturally lay on the head.
Second layer crinoline, part three (not pictured):
I cut two lengths of black crinoline and folded it in half. I tied over the ends and secured with thread. The folded over end was made to fit between the twisted crinoline piece attached in the previous step, at the front of the wig and sewn around inside the front of the frame. The tied over ends were secured at the bun area on the back of the wig.
The bun construction (pictured below):
I cut three lengths of black crinoline and folded it in half. I tied over the ends and secured with thread. The long edges were then folded around onto each other to form a tube, which was then secured with thread. I cut a two length piece, tied over the ends independently and slid this down inside the first tube to give it more structure.
The tube was then coiled into a bun shape and attached to the back of the wig, so concealing the tied over ends of the crinoline from the earlier stages.
The finishing touch (pictured below):
An elastic strap and clip were added into the inner back end of the frame, to allow for the wigs to potentially be used on different sized mannequin heads.
MAKING THE “HALF UP-HALF DOWN” WIG
First layer of crinoline, part one (pictured below on the left):
I cut two lengths of ivory crinoline and folded it in half. I tied over the ends and independently secured with thread. I pinned and sewed the central folded section to the outer edge of the front of the frame. I then secured the tied together end to the middle back of the frame.
First layer of crinoline, part two (pictured below on the right):
I cut two pieces of two lengths of ivory crinoline. I stitched it on its side around the circumference of the frame from the centre front. I tied over the ends of the two layers together, and stitched the ends to the above ear position on either side.
First layer of crinoline for side parting, and under layer for long hair at the nape of the neck (pictured below on the right):
I cut two pieces of two lengths of crinoline, put them back-to-back and stitched them together, gathering the width as I went to pull it in. The two layers were then opened up and flattened against the line of stitching before being sewn around the frame with the long side edge lined up with the base of the frame.
Three pieces of two-and-a-half lengths of crinoline were cut, folded in half and stitched underneath the back of the frame pointing downwards. they were staggered to cover more width across the back of the frame.
Second under layer (pictured above on the right and below):
Two pieces of two-and-a-half lengths of crinoline were cut, folded in half and stitched on the outer face of the wig at the back of the frame pointing downwards. Where folded, they were sewn in an arc-shape to the top of the head.
Third under layer (pictured below):
One piece of four lengths of crinoline was cut, twisted at the halfway point and slid under the previous layer of crinoline that was attached to the front hairline of the wig. It was pulled and overlapped centrally at the back of the head, in the position where the ponytail would be, and fixed with a stitch.
Parting, part one (pictured below):
I cut two pieces of four lengths of crinoline, put them back-to-back and stitched them together, gathering the width as I went to pull it in. The two layers were then opened up and flattened against the line of stitching. This was sewn onto the top of the wig at the parting line.
Parting, part two (pictured below):
The parting layers were brought around from the front hairline, and twisted at the position of the ears. These layers, plus the two downward under layers, were sewn together with a stitch behind the ear position.
Parting layers from the crown of the head (pictured below):
I cut two pieces of two-and-a-half lengths of crinoline, twisted them at the centre point and sewed them into an arrow-shape. These pieces were fixed at the end of the first parting line to add layers to the crown of the head. As the parting is a side parting, an extra one piece of two and a half lengths was folded in half and added to the proper left side to fill in the gap.
The ponytail:
I don’t have work in progress images of how I made the ponytail. All the pieces I added in the previous step were pulled over the head and angled back to the ponytail position. I then wrapped another piece if crinoline around them to create the ponytail.
The finishing touch:
An elastic strap and clip were added into the inner back end of the frame, to allow for the wigs to potentially be used on different sized mannequin heads.
MAKING BESPOKE PIECES FOR EXHIBITIONS, DISPLAYS AND CREATIVE PROJECTS
I really enjoy projects that involve collaboration with museums, institutions, designers, artists, and creative teams. Whether the brief is historically inspired, theatrical, sculptural, or entirely experimental, there is something very satisfying about making a bespoke head adornment that serves a particular purpose. The crinoline wigs for the Fashion Museum Bath were a lovely example of that: a practical display object, a creative commission, and a material experiment all at once.
If you are working on an exhibition, photoshoot, performance, installation, or display and need bespoke wigs, sculptural headpieces, or other handmade objects, I’d be very happy to discuss what might be possible. You can contact me here.
Every project starts with a conversation – about materials, context, visual references, durability, scale, and how the finished piece needs to function. From there, we can develop something made specifically for your setting.
In the below photographs, the wigs are styled with hats from my personal collection. I will share additional images from the Fashion Museum Bath photoshoots as they become available.
In the meantime you can see a few more photographs on my website here.
