I love perfectly polished pinup hair! I really admire people who set their hair and create intricate rolls. Sadly, I am not among their ranks. I have no patience for styling my stubborn hair and honestly I am just not good at it. I tend to focus on making accessories and I have made loads of different things (nail polish hair pins, vintage inspired hair pins, bow knot hair bands, no dent hair elastics, fruity and floral headbands, regular tie up headscarves, how to make headscarves non-slip and shaped, wired, scarf tie headbands). But on to this turban headband….
I’ve had a turban type thing in mind for a while. Last winter I was experimenting with various headwraps, just tying up a scarf around my head with a knot. I really liked the look and wore it several times but I was never sure how to do my fringe so that it looked nice. Then I got the hang of bumper bangs and the idea of turbans went back on my sewing list. I already had quite a few vintage sewing patterns and some newer turban tutorials saved on pinterest. Then suddenly my instgram feed was filled with pinups wearing headband style turbans that have the knot/bouf/scrunch pre sewn. The two main sellers I saw were from ‘Who’s That Girl‘ and ‘Sarah’s Do Wop Do’s‘ if you are interested in buying one. I loved what I saw but I knew exactly what I wanted and that’s the reason sew. It was definitely time to have a go at sewing a turban!
I wasn’t entirely sure how to go about constructing one of these turbans, as I hadn’t seen one in real life and I wasn’t going to order one to copy someone else’s design because that is just wrong! And I wanted to come up with my own design, a style that suited me in terms of size and shape. Before I even started I knew that I wanted something big enough be a statement but that would sit behind my bumper bangs. I decided that stretch fabric was probably the way to go. I had a stretchy black crushed velvet remnant that was somewhere in my stash. I thought I’d start by making a standard stretch headband and figure out a knot/bouf later. In the end, that plan worked pretty well!
I wanted my finished headband to be fairly wide, so I decided to go with a 30.5cm (12”) width, which will make a 13cm (5”) wide finished headband. I think 50cm to 55cm (20” to 22”) is a good length for the average head, depending on how much stretch the fabric has and if you want to sit over the ears. Stretch headbands and I don’t always get along, they tend to slip if they are too big. I cut out my head band piece to 55cm accordingly, making sure the stretch in the fabric stretched along the length (so it will stretch around your head!). I laid the rectangle right sides together so the long sides were touching, hot dog style and pinned along the long side. I used a stretch stitch to sew along the edge, backstitching at the beginning and end. I trimmed my threads and turned the tube right sides out.
It’s going to seem weird but pull the tube back on itself, right sides together, until the short raw edges meet. Align the seams and sew most of the way around, just leaving a 2.5cm (1”) turning gap. It’s a bit of a wiggle to sew in such a small area but go slow and you’ll be fine. Carefully turn the whole thing right side out and ta da, a headband! Depending on where you are going with this headband, you may want to close up the gap with hand stitching or just a little topstitch.
The kind of tied scarf turban (like this) I was thinking of has a pretty dense kind of knot and that was the look I was going for. Since I had a remnant piece to work with, I just played around until I had a pleasing knot shape. I wanted it to stay in shape, so I hand stitched it until things were secure. As I worked around I made sure the wrong side of the fabric was hidden from view and tried to keep my stitches hidden behind folds. I trimmed and tucked in the underside and stitched that down too. Even though I was winging it, it worked really nicely.
On to attaching the knot! Again, I didn’t really have a plan because I wanted to see how the knot came out first. I cut a strip of fabric 6” wide by 8” long and stitched it into a tube, just like the first step of making the headband. I hand stitched the middle of the tube to the base of the knot, sewing down both sides. I gathered the headband on top of the sewn down tube and brought the short ends together and safety pinned the ends into a loop. This gathered up the headband nicely and attached the knot so I could try my turban on. I missed taking a photo (oops) but once I knew I was happy with everything, I hand stitched the loop closed. And voila!
I love how my turban looks! I know I will black more often than any other colour but it was really hard to photograph the turban against my black hair but hopefully you can see how sweet it looks. I adore it with bumper bangs in real life but you can see the turban better with my fringe just swooped. It’s really comfy to wear and fits my head just right. I think this is the ultimate in bad hair day/grown out roots chic! I am all about huge hair and some days you just can’t get the volume you want. I love the height of this and I love how it adds vintage flair to a more casual outfit. It came out exactly as I envisaged, which is pretty good for an experiment! I am absolutely certain that there are better ways to make this though. I wanted to get it made so I could wear it to an upcoming event, so I just launched in. I was making things up as I was going along but I still thought I’d put up a tutorial because I couldn’t find a tutorial for this type of turban headband. Maybe my slap dash effort will help someone come up with an improved version. If anyone knows a better way to make this, I’d love to know your secrets! But for now I will wear my turban with pride because I think it’s fabulous!
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Additional info
Tee from Sunshine Coast Pinup School
Skirt is made by me – tutorial here
Earrings from eBay
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