Budget Dimensional Brim Cutting Gizmo

[enigmata_wood]

I looked at a few hatters' websites and saw some ingenious professional tools.
I was modifying an old hat and wanted to cut the brim dimensionally.
I only needed the tool once so what I came up with was a 2-step way to emulate the all-in-one brim trimmers I'd seen.
I used cardboard and drew a circle with a diameter a little bigger than the hat's crown.
From the centre of the circle I drew a radiating line to get a true tangent to the curve.
From the curve I measured the distance I wanted the BROADEST PART of the brim and poked a hole at that point with the point of the compasses.
I cut this out as shown here:
http://www.freewebs.com/hersir-irminsul ... splays.htm
I put a white pencil in the hole, pressed the concave curve gently against the point where brim and crown meet, and ran it round the hat.
It's important to keep the pencil upright (you could tape it in place) and work round the brim watching out for wobble.
I trimmed along the white line with ordinary sharp tailor's scissors.
I subtracted the broadest and narrowest brim measurements and used the white pencil to mark that distance on each side at the edge of the brim.
I trimmed the excess off by eye following a curve that gently met up with the edge.
I have a good eye but if you are trying this you may want to use French curves to mark the whole curve.
It works perfectly.
Enigmata