Join the millinery courses offered by Louise Macdonald in Melbourne

Want to learn how to make your own hat? Join the millinery courses offered at Louise Macdonald's studio in Melbourne!

Current millinery courses
(click on a link below to view the details of the selected millinery course)

Make a Wire-Work Hat or Headpiece

Millinery Intensive 3 days: Felt and Leather

Beginners and Intermediate Millinery

Millinery Intensive 5 days: Silk Abaca and Hat of your Own Design

Freeform Headpiece from Fine Straw

Make a Stylish Fedora

Make a Wire-Work Hat or Headpiece
Tutor: Lynnette Lim
Push your creative boundaries! Leave those limiting blocks and create a small hat or headpiece from wire. In this 2-day course you will learn how to fashion a shape from millinery wire, cover your frame and explore appropriate trims for your design. Make a "toy" topper or a heavenly headpiece... let your imagination run wild!

Saturday and Sunday 25 and 26 May 2013, 10am to 4pm
Cost: $295 (plus materials)
Course code: WWMay

Saturday and Sunday 15 and 16 June 2013, 10am to 4pm
Cost: $295 (plus materials)
Course code: WWJune

Saturday and Sunday 7 and 8 September 2013, 10am to 4pm
Cost: $295 (plus materials)
Course code: WWSept

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Millinery Intensive 3 days: Felt and Leather
Tutors: Georgina Conheady and Lynnette Lim
Learn to block a felt pillbox or beret and use the remaining felt to trim and create a masterpiece! On the third day, Lynn Lim will teach you how to make wonderful hat trims from leather.

Saturday to Monday 1 to 3 June 2013, 10am to 4pm
Cost: $430 (includes leather for trimming, but not the felt; students will need to budget about another $40 for this)
Course code: MIJUN

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Beginners and Intermediate Millinery
Tutor: Louise Macdonald
Make your own beautiful hat using traditional millinery techniques taught by one of Australia's leading milliners. These small classes are open to beginner and intermediate students, catering to different levels of experience. Students will make a hat from start to finish, moulding the materials over the traditional wooden hat blocks using a variety of techniques depending on their experience.

8 sessions over 8 weeks
Monday evenings 15 July to 2 September 2013, 6pm to 8.30pm
Cost: $495
Course code: BIJul

View how to enrol in one or more courses
Millinery Intensive 5 days: Silk Abaca and Hat of your Own Design
Tutors: Georgina Conheady and Louise Macdonald
Make 2 hats or headpieces in this 5-day millinery intensive. You will make a hat of your own design from felt or straw with Louise Macdonald over 3 days. During the other 2 days Georgina Conheady will show you how to make a headpiece from the fine and lusterous Silk Abaca. You will first block and then sculpt the remaining material to produce a beautiful piece of millinery for yourself. Millinery intensives are a great way to immerse yourself in the creative world of millinery. Suitable for beginner or intermediate students.

Monday to Friday 29 July to 3 August 2013, 10am to 4pm
Cost: $650
Course code: MIJUL

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Freeform Headpiece from Fine Straw
Tutor: Georgina Conheady
Use contemporary millinery techniques to make a hat from parisisal straw. Milliner Georgina Conheady will be your tutor for the weekend and guide you through the steps to make your own hat for the races, street wear or wedding.

Saturday and Sunday 17 and 18 August 2013, 10am to 4pm
Cost: $310
Course code: FFAug

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Make a Stylish Fedora
Tutor: Lynnette Lim

Channel your inner pop star and get ready to thwart the paparazzi. Contemplate cool, to the likes of Miranda Kerr, Sarah Jessica Parker and Jessica Alba, while you learn to make a fashionable fedora from stunning straw. Block, shape and produce a first-class finish for your hat using traditional millinery techniques then customise your creation with a timeless ribbon trim or a more contemporary concoction.

Saturday and Sunday 23 and 24 November 2013, 10am to 4pm
Cost: $295 (plus materials)
Course code: FDNov

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Previous millinery courses: These courses have already taken place and may run again soon. Subscribe to Louise's newsletter to be notified when new courses become available:

January Summer Schools (5-day millinery intensive courses)

Option 1 – Cloche, ribbon origami, fabric covered beret
Make a straw or felt cloche with Louise Macdonald over 2 days, with the third day spent making some folded ribbon cocade trims for your hats! In the remaining 2 days, be instructed by milliner Georgina Conheady, covering a blocked beret shape in fabric. You will come away with 2 hats made by you and a variety of contemporary techniques!

Cost: $630 plus some materials

Option 2 – French flower making, lace hat, sculpted headpiece
Georgina Conheady will share her French flower making skills, with a day of making your own beautiful silk flowers, perhaps a perfect trim for the blocked lace hat you will make with Georgina on the Tuesday and Wednesday. The final 2 days you will make your own special beret or sculpted headpiece (photo) with Louise Macdonald. A great range of skills to learn for the budding milliner.

Cost: $630 plus some materials

Option 3 – Hat of your own design, Jin Sin headpiece, plastic freeform headwear
This is a 5-day millinery intensive course. Make your own special hat from felt or straw with Louise Macdonald over 3 days. In the other 2 days, Georgina Conheady will introduce you to 2 contemporary materials for millinery: Jin Sin and plastic. Learn how to heat and shape these fibers to produce modern headpieces and trims.

Cost: $630 plus some materials

Trimming Weekend – Silk Flowers: Rose and Camellia
Tutor: Georgina Conheady
Learn how to make 2 beautiful silk flowers! In this workshop, Georgina Conheady will show you the way to work with silk and traditional flower making techniques and tools to create a rose and a camellia.

Cost: $155

Trimming Weekend – Ribbon Origami
Tutor: Louise Macdonald
Wondering how to decorate your cloche hat? This workshop will give you plenty of trimming inspiration as Louise revisits her years making hats for the BBC series "The House of Eliott". You will learn some twisting and folding techniques with ribbon to create a selection of 1920s style Cocade trims.

Cost: $155
Material cost: You are free to purchase your own ribbon before the workshop (the list of required lengths and thickness will be sent on enrolment) or purchase a ribbon kit on the day for $40

Millinery Intensive 4 days: Jin Sin and Wire Work
Tutors: Georgina Conheady and Lynnette Lim
This intensive offers 4 days of creative fun! Under the direction of Georgina Conheady, you will learn to block and sculpt with the contemporary millinery material, Jin Sin, to create a spectacular headpiece. For the other 2 days: push your creative boundaries! Leave those limiting blocks and create a small hat or headpiece from wire. Millinery Lynn Lim will show you how to fashion a shape from millinery wire, cover your frame and explore appropriate trims for your design. Make a "toy" topper or a heavenly headpiece... let your imagination run wild!

Cost: $520

Silk Abaca Headpiece
Tutor: Georgina Conheady
Silk Abacca is a new millinery material. Its fine lusterous qualities make it ideal for trimming and blocking. Georgina Conheady will show you how to make a headpiece from this beautiful material, producing a fine piece of millinery for yourself in this 2-day workshop.

Cost: $295 (plus materials)

Silk Flowers: Chrysanthemum, Orchid and Poppy
Tutor: Georgina Conheady
Learn how to make 3 beautiful silk flowers! In this workshop, Georgina Conheady will show you how to work with silk and traditional flower making techniques and tools to create a chrysanthemum, an orchid and a poppy. All flowers that would make a bridal hair decoration or a divine hat trim.

Cost: $155 (includes silk)

Enquiries – For more information, contact Louise Macdonald's millinery studio – 03 9650 1352 or +61 3 9650 1352.

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