Today I'm going to show you how I made my BatHarley cowl. You can also use this for a Batgirl cosplay and technically anyone in the batfamily that wears a cowl.
Now I've never made a cowl before so for the most part I winged it. I did look at a couple of basic tutorials but in the end I really just made it up as I went along.
Ok, let's start!
First, your materials:
-A reference photo
-Fabric (I used felt and I'll explain why later but you can use whatever you think it best)
-Needle and thread (or sewing machine. I used a mix of hand sewing and machine sewing)
-Pins to hold your fabric in place
-Duct tape and/or electical tape (I used a mix of both, I'll explain why later)
-A plastic bag or saran wrap
-A Manikin head
-Black paint (or I guess that rubber dip stuff)
-Paint brush
-Velcro
-Craft Foam
-Rubberband
Okee dokee, this is the reference photo I went off of but you can use whatever character you're doing:
So it is a pretty basic batgirl type cowl.
Next take your manikin head, plastic bag and tape!
Now, you want to make sure that your manikin head is close to the size that your own head is. I'm lucky to have a manikin that has roughly the same size head as I do due to it being from my time in beauty school. You can pick up a simple Styrofoam one at any craft store (I've seen them at Hobby Lobby and Joann's). These one's tend to be smaller than the average human head so you'll want to beef it up so that it matches your head size.
Take your plastic bag and cover the head tightly! Tie it off with a rubber band (it'll help hold it in place so it's not sliding around for the next part.
Next I used electrical tape to map out the eye holes and the basic edges of the cowl. I used electrical tape because it's thinner and a little easier to work with than duct tape. After you have the basic shape fill in the spaces with duct tape (except the eye holes of course). Make sure to layer it pretty good so that it will retain it's shape. Also I didn't bother with the ears at this point. We'll worry about that later. After that your manikin should look something like this:
Next, gently remove the whole thing off your head. If it's a little too tight cut straight up the back a little so that it will slide off. Don't worry, we can always tape it back up. After that cut off all the extra plastic and carefully cut out the eye wholes completely. Once that's done it should look something like this:
Now comes the nerve wracking part because this duct tape cowl is now out pattern. Put the duct tape cowl back on you manikin and start mapping out the parts to cut out. I don't have a picture of this part but basically I just drew a line from the inner corner of the eye holes to the back the cowl in a straight line. Also keep in mind that Batgirl has a different cowl than Batman's. Batman's cowl goes all the way down his neck but Batgirl has a window in the back for her hair to come out of. Now you don't have to have the window if you just want a short cowl but I made a window for my hair because I like Batgirl. So draw out a basic wind shape. Really you just want a basic shape that shows how high you want the window to start, how low you want it to go and how wide you want it.
After it's all mapped out, take it off the manikin and start cutting! I would recommend taking your time with mapping everything out since you can only cut so much! After you cut out the pieces you want to trace them out onto your fabric. Since the sides curve you'll want to cut a slit into the top to make it lay relatively flat. This is basically what it should look like:
Ok so now why did I use this green felt? Well, I had a bunch of felt I wasn't using and felt is a very sturdy fabric. Also I found that when it came to sewing everything together the felt made it look really seamless which is what you want. I didn't have any more black though so I just went with green and decided to paint it (I did experiments on some scraps before I started though). Also it turned out using green made for a lot less eye strain!
Now, once you've traced everything out you'll want to cut out those pieces. Leave a seam allowance on the sides that will be sewn otherwise cut everything else to size. I also didn't cut out the darts yet, I just traced them for now but we'll cut them later.
When you have all the pieces cut out pin them together and put them on your manikin head to make sure the size if somewhat fine. At this point I found out that one of my sides was really too big so I traced the other side on to the too big one and cut it out to make sure the sides matched. Once your sides and sized correctly and everything is pinned together on your manikin you can pin you darts together to show where you will be cutting them out. It should look something like this:
After it's all pinned gently take it off the manikin and carefully put it on your head (if you put in the hair window then this should be really easy). Check in the mirror if everything is fitting correctly.
Now I'm using my own hair for this cosplay but if you are using a wig then you want to make sure that it's not too tight for it.
When you are sure everything fits correctly put it back on your manikin. Then you cut out your darts and pin together so you sew it.
Now, take it off your manikin and start sewing everything together. Make sure to turn it inside out and start by sewing your sides to the middle piece. Then sew together where you made your darts. Don't worry about the mask/eye hole parts. I ended up doing those later. After that put it back on your head to check to make sure everything fits snuggly and of course that it looks pretty seamless.
Next it's time for the mask. I had some issues with this. The way that I mapped them out made them crease when you wore it instead of looking seamless so I ended up cutting the whole mask part off and re positioning it so that is sat correctly. But once you mask is all situated sew it together.
Now it's time for the ears. Basically all I did was take scrap of felt that was already in a triangle shape and held it onto the manikin to see how long I wanted it and how wide. Then I cut out a second shape for the other ear. Next I cut out two pieces of craft foam that were smaller than the pieces of felt. I really just made these to make sure that the ears stayed straight and upright. Next I cut out two more pieces of felt that were shorter than the ears. Then I sewed both pieces together and inserted the craft foam pieces. Then I roughly hand sewed the bottom of the short side so that the craft foam wouldn't fall out. Then I pinned the ears on to make sure that everything was symmetrical.
When you are sure everything sits correctly hand sew the ears onto to cowl. I found it to be easiest if you sew the top crevice between the ear and the cowl first and them move onto the edges. When both ears are sewn on it should look like this:
Now, unless you are making a green lantern batman you'll want to make your cowl black. As I said before I experimented with paint before I started. I used cheap black acrylic paint and it ended up making the cowl pretty stiff which was fine with me since I wanted it to hold it's shape. I also had to do a couple of coats, but make sure that you wait until each layer is completely dry before adding another coat. It makes it a lot easier to tell what still needs to be painted.
There isn't any real technique to doing this, just go at it with your paint brush until everything is covered.
Once your cowl is completely black just add velcro to the back straps to fasten the back under the hair. I used self adhesive velcro but you can use whatever you fancy.
And that's it! Go out and be the hero Gotham deserves! Or in my case Harley Quinn masquerading as a Bat Family member.
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