In 2011 we entered the Craft & Design Selected Awards and won a silver award in the Textile & Needlework category, which we were totally delighted to achieve.

Now in 2012 we have entered into the competition for a second year and it would be great if you could help us reach our ‘gold’ ambition? Just follow the link below

http://www.craftmaker.co.uk/sallyharperkenn/

Thank you so much for your ongoing support.

We were delighted to find out that we were shortlisted as potential winners in the accessories categories for the wedding industry awards for the West Midlands. We were even more thrilled to find out that we had won best regional supplier for accessories. The awards take place on 18th January to decide who will win overall. With over 13 categories including wedding planner, cakes, florist, photographer, dress and venue to name a few. The event takes place at Cafe de Paris in Covent Garden and will be a great chance to network with the best in the business and have a fabulous night out.

We will keep you posted with news of the event.

To all of our wonderful customers we’ve been working with over the past years and to our new found customers we wish you a very happy new year and our very best wishes for 2012. We hope that we can grow everyone of our successes for this new and fresh year. Looking back we have much to be thankful for from 2011 including winning a silver award from the Craft & Design Selected Awards in the Textile and Needlework category. We also were regional winners for accessories in the Wedding Industry Awards for 2012, the awards evening will be held on 18th January and we will find out if we have won over all in the accessories category (please look out for our next blog post for more details) We have also featured in Brides magazine several times and have attended many events including DVB in February and October.

There is much more to come for 2012, so we hope to keep you posted with our news. For daily updates check us out on Twitter @SharperMilliner and Facebook at Sharper Millinery.

Happy New Year xx

Well the loveliness of the show is still bounding about on facebook and twitter, all in all a fabulous show with lots of lovely people.
Its always great to meet new suppliers and this is always a good place to meet like minded designers, my stand was next to kelly from Boho Events and Lucy from Lucy Ledger Designs and I couldn’t have asked for a better spot! Right by the entrance to the show you could get yourself some old fashioned sweets (fabulous for a show sugar rush) and then there was Sharper Millinery on the right.
A big thank you to the organisers Clare Guest and Rachel Simpson along with Matt Simpson and Branwen Cook did a great job of making the show work. Not only making sure everyone had what they wanted but organising a new space very last minute, selling loads of tickets before hand, keeping the potential brides happy with shows and workshops and always making sure that we as suppliers were happy!
The Ava girls were on fire as well with their stand showing off their very talented skills of floral tables and chair buttons, styling and wonderful sweet treats. Mrs Bou also had a stand to show of her wonderful yellow treats on the Boutique Baking Stand, delish! It was also great to see Laurel Lime, The Wedding Club, Rachel Simpson Shoes and Vintage Glamour days.
The bloggers were out in force too which is always great to see and put a face to a name. Always good to see Kat Williams from RocknRoll Bride and Annabel from Love My Dress, this time I also met Amma from Beyond Beyond (who looked fabulous in one of our hats throughout the weekend) and Alexis from OMG I’m Married!

……………………and the best thing so far is that we have had a lot of enquiries and brides wanting to book appointments to get a special headpiece created for their big day.

Looking forward to next year already! xx

Check out our photos on facebook

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1010375447#!/pages/Sharper-Millinery/176520383311

Well what a year it has been for some of our lovely clients at the races. We have seen Sharper Millinery shine in competitions for Best hat, best dressed and best dressed couple at race courses throughout the uk. its great for putting Sharper Millinery on the map and showing that you don’t have to live in London to get the best quality design. there was plenty of competition around but in the end we managed to win the titles!
We were asked recently what our signature look was and Sally replied ‘we have it all!’ At Sharper Millinery we don’t have a definite style that our clients have to conform to we create (within reason!) whatever they are looking for and we love a challenge! usually the challenge is keeping the new creation on the head of our lovely client, so some good engineering comes into play here.
So back to winners……………………..well the best bar far was when Debbie Grogan decided to go up to Ayr races for one of their meetings in July. During the summer season they have 3 events where by 8 of the best dressed ladies on the day receive a bronze coin for their effort. Now this may seem a bit measly but this is just the beginning! the ladies with the coins are invited back for a final race event in September where by they qualify in a sweepstake draw. So from now on its complete luck and all dependent on the horse you picked, so lucky for Debbie she picked the winning horse!

‘My legs have gone to jelly’ she told me as she announced she had won! Her car should be delivered to her within the next couple of weeks. What a fabulous prize to win for wearing a fabulous hat and outfit.

Debbie is pictured in her blue and white flower outfit with blue quills headpiece.

Here at sharper Millinery we love the chance to be able to work with other talented designers, especially when they make beautiful shoes! Rachel Simpson Shoes approached us about creating some headpieces for the shoot for her new collection of shoes and we jumped at the chance! The theme was Black swan so we mixed tradition white and cream with blacks and reds to create a stunning new bridal collection. Small flowers with jewelled centres, feather bands and satin roses in cream and ivory mixed with black veiling and jewels created an opulent and contrasting mix of textures and colours. Emma Case was the wonderful photographer that really captured the essence of the new collection…………fabulous!
For further details about the collection please contact Sally at the studio on 0121 745 2959

Hi all and again I have a huge apology to make, I haven’t been very good at blogging during the September. Plenty to talk about though and lots of interesting things in the pipeline for you all. Especially for brides we have a new winter collection for you and for winter race goers a special sneek peak at some of our new pieces.
So where to start really……………………………….lets see……………..at the beginning of September we set up a date for a new photo shoot, thats happening this weekend. So will post the pictures very soon. We have plenty more to tell you, but we want to do it with photos! So check back to see all our news in other blog posts xx

Mrs Bou from Boutique Baking Company asked for a top hat to finish off her outfit. We thought that this would be a great idea and looked at some of her beautiful cakes for inspiration, ‘The Cakery Bakery Top Hat’ was born. The sculpted icing and frosting inspired me to pleat fabric around the crown of the top hat and make organza roses very similar to those adorned on her wonderful cakes, a lovely vintage brooch finished the hat off. Her dress was a wonderful creation from 2birds which can be worn in over 15 different ways (available at The Wedding Club). Cake photo courtesy of Alex Beadon Photography.

href=”http://www.sharpermillinery.co.uk/sharpernews/wp-content/uploads/027.jpg”>Clare’s dress inspired an Audrey Hepburn look for her headpiece. Taking inspiration from the colours in the dress of hot pink, rose, ivory and black we created a blocked beret shape trimmed with bubble crin and adorned with biot feathers and quills. The side of the headpiece features a large organza flower dyed to match the colours in the dress. Clare’s other accessories such as her large glasses, black gloves and Rachel Simpson Mimi shoes finished her outfit beautifully.

Amy’s headpiece ‘Peacock Bubbles’ was inspired by her gorgeous vintage cocktail dress. The aqua colour of the dress and the metallic lime green heels were a perfect colour match to some elegant peacock feathers. Some people believe that peacock feathers are bad luck, in the Far East they are believed to be very lucky!
The base of the headpiece was created with bubble crin with colours added to blend the aqua, navy blue and lime green. The large peacock feathers were the main adornment but small lime pheasant and a blue brooch were also added. A lightweight headpiece that is very easy to wear.