One Special Artist Paints Medical Helmets For Babies
Story by:
Brittany High
Artist Paula Strawn turns plain medical helmets for babies into tiny wearable artworks. Suddenly, a piece of equipment can have personality, color, and a much better introduction than a worried stranger’s question. Medical science, man. I love it. Medical science with a paintbrush? Even better.
The original Incredible Things story celebrated the transformation in 2014. The appeal is easy to understand: the baby still needs the prescribed helmet, but the outside does not have to look like an unfinished project. Strawn makes that surface an opportunity for something cheerful and personal.
A Small Canvas With Big Personality
A curved helmet presents a different challenge from a flat canvas. Its shape becomes part of the design, wrapping the artwork around the wearer instead of hanging it on a wall. The result is an accessory that draws attention to creativity, rather than inviting everyone to inspect a medical condition.
That is the lovely part of this idea. It leaves room for families to enjoy a little silliness during treatment. A helmet can be practical and playful at the same time. Babies already manage to make socks look adorable; giving their headgear a proper art direction feels entirely reasonable. Tiny canvas, very big style points.
What Those Helmets Actually Do
The original description suggested that flat head syndrome was something these children were necessarily born with. That needs a correction. The American Academy of Pediatrics explains that positional head flattening can develop before birth, but more often appears during early infancy as pressure affects the skull’s shape.
A clinician decides whether treatment is needed. Some babies improve with positioning changes or physical therapy; selected cases may need a custom helmet. As the Academy’s helmet therapy guide explains, the device supports gradual growth toward a rounder shape. The painting is decoration, not the treatment itself.
The Artist Behind the Designs
Strawn’s work continued attracting attention after the original article. In a July 2017 ABC News report, a family described choosing a Back to the Future theme for their son’s helmet. Strawn told the outlet that a suggestion from her daughter’s teacher had first led her into helmet painting.
The same report described how choosing a design could help parents feel more positive about the experience. That is a family response to an art project, not evidence that paint changes medical outcomes. Still, there is real charm in turning an unwanted accessory into something a family helped imagine.
Art Worth Smiling About
This is an appreciation of Strawn’s artwork, rather than instructions for modifying prescribed equipment. Families considering decoration should check with the clinician or orthotist responsible for their child’s helmet before changing anything. Fit, ventilation, cleaning, and the device’s purpose take priority over a particularly excellent design idea.
Related question: how do they fix Big Head Syndrome? I’m asking for me. Ah, yeah, you’re right. Probably too late to correct that issue. Looks like I’m a big head for life. At least these babies have somebody making their headgear look considerably cooler than mine.
Paula,
Your ingenious! What type paints did you use that adheres to the slippery plastic?
Plus if you would have taken the time to look at the girls link before getting all nat and down on someone about princesses you would see there are tons of options, girly aviator, cowgirl wonder women and lots of other amazing works! Pure talent, what a wonderful way to share it! Love it
This is so sweet making those helpful helmrts less boring. It really is more for parents as children thay young don’t care.
Great work! Great cause!
My son just got one! This is amazing to such a sad situation. How do you get this done??
What a cute little dude!
The artist’s contact information is on her page. Just visit: http://www.lazardo.smugmug.com/
Good luck 🙂
Awh shucks thank you
Does anyone know where to actually get any of these? My neice needs one
My daughter has to wear a helmet & I would love to get something like this done.
I believe this is a wonderful idea. My son has epilepsy and has had to wear the special helmet. He started the seizures at age 2 and is now 20. I asked him if he wanted to go to college and his reply was no. I asked him why he said because people there would make fun of his helmet and he’s tired of people making fun of him. Keep up the good work
That’s amazing and selfless of her to do that.
I tried painting my son’s medical helmet once, but the paint chipped off. I’m curious what materials are used to make the paint stay on.
My almost 7 year old has a helmet because he bangs his head so it is for protection. He also has seizures. I would love to have it painted like one of those… Now what design???? 🙂 Awesome thing you are doing.
What a wonderful thing you are doing. These are beautiful!! It gives the people that stare something to REALLY look at. Great work!!
Creative and artistic!
I think it’s wonderful that she is painting the helmets. Our helmet was ordered incorrectly and rather than waste time waiting for a patterned one, we kept the white. I decorated it with clear stickers. It actually looked nice and we could change it up…even for his great grams birthday! Painting these helmets makes light of a difficult situation…this is great!
What an awesome way to bring a smile to some ones face ! Incredible work !
Simply lovely! What a wonderful thing for this artist to do. The bright eyes and smile of the child in the picture melts my heart.
Since the question posed above is about other ways to paint a baby helmet, I’d suggest perhaps one with bright colors from the “The Hungry Caterpillar” book, the mutli-color shoes from “Pete the Cat” book or even Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter. I love reading my 5month old those stories as part of bedtime routine.
If he were in need of a helmet, I’d be filled with joy there is someone out there willing to spend the time to make my son’s time in the helmet a little brighter and match our fave books.
My 6 year old loves princesses, has a pink room, princess pyjamas and lot’s of princess dresses…and decided on her own to dress up a DINOSAUR for Carnaval (kind of like Dutch Halloween) this year. So there.
pretty pink dinosaur princess?
A fuzzy green one, including green facepaint and a huge mouth with pointy teeth. 🙂
did you give it feathers?
Being a princess is not about being saved by a prince but about thinking you are beautiful and important and worth all the world has to offer.
The newest princess’s on the block(frozen) didn’t need saving. They saved themselves and each other, proving that family should stick together.
she was also an apparently evil ice queen who probably froze half her subjects to death and then everything was magically ok at the end because… shes the one with an army and army killing ice powers I guess? the sister was damned lucky the prince turned out to be evil, that arc got concluded far more neatly than was realistic, and the “lets throw a ball every day and remove the town gates” thing is not sustainable economically(and the military may have a thing or two to say about the gate thing, but ice powers that strong she can just make a new wall if needed so thats not an issue)
nobody important was on scene to see….well ANY of the important events in that movie, even the end where she killed her sister and the prince tried to smash her and then did his evil rant, they were in the middle of a harbor in a blizzard where they couldnt even see 20 feet in front of them….but people on the balcony in the castle cheered knew what was going on and were implied to hear what was said. what?
so she didn’t need rescuing but it’d have helped since while totally not evil and they saved themselves by sticking together ect…as far as anybody else knows she is queen maleficent. also that dutch guy was totally up to something and deserved banishment in some vague unfulfilled way but neither she nor anybody else had any reason to know this. even if she did closing your port isn’t the best move hes totally coming back with a navy with most of the nearby countries as allies after word of her winter rampage gets out, rumor always flys faster than facts and BURN THE WITCH. kingdom nuking levels of magic are hella scary especially in the hands of an unstable young girl. its not even an old chrone you can endure and outlive you’ve got an entire reign to weather and a handy heir to smooth out the succession after you poison the queen and hang the scapegoat. Too bad she didn’t have another noble on hand to back up her version of the story, events in the sequel would go much smoother with a non evil prince, her father taught her to hide it her entire life for a good reason.
now you might say none of that has a place in a disney princess movie, but you can’t inject ambitious backstabing nobility and murderous succession into happy sparkly magic kingdoms without some baggage.
_____
now…if the suddenly evil prince also turned out to have ice powers in that fight at the end and/or if he died and they blamed him that would make much more sense as a conclusion and solved several problems. he even spent the entire time wearing gloves.(i honestly expected this to be a thing and was surprised it wasn’t)
we know magic can be cursed on you and with ambition like that his entire family would be safer with him thrown under the bus anyway. the guy fucking over the town and making everybody (including her) think she did it makes sense.
basically the movie was a strung together pile of plotholes even for disney’s audience and needed to be about twice as long to resolve any of them. but one way or another a prince would have helped those, a good prince would make them much less of a target for other countries and seemed to be doing a good job keeping the subjects on their side, and the evil prince could have been a much more relevant thing and solved some problems for the sisters if he was also magic, as it is he felt tacked on so they could keep the ice cutter(the only other way to solve that arc would be for the sisters to each pick one, maybe the elder “retiring” as a faked death to live with the woodsman since she seemed so oppressed in her role and liked the ice mountain, up until prince tuned evil that felt like the direction they’d take it(he loved her ice castle, great ice and he knows ice) which I am glad they didn’t).
Calm down… You’re going to give yourself an embolism.. It’s just a Disney movie, if you go and over analyse the inconsistencies in every Disney movie you’ll be doing it for the rest of your life..
Wow…..
You, sir or madam, have to much time on your hands. It’s a kids movie. Not Game of Thrones.
I love you
This woman has done something amazing, precious and so humanizing for the most innocent among us and all you can do is bitch and bicker about princesses and feminism … you’re a pathetic and heartless lot for being so self-absorbed in your fickle agendas.
Some of these comments are seriously ridiculous, lol, how did an artist creating a medical helmet for a child turn into a debate about girls and princesses, people seriously need to get a life
you are so right. what a way to ease the time for someone who has a physical condition that will be rectified at the end. instead of feeling sorry for what the child is wearing, it shows that it is for the best and for him/her to enjoy expressing that their ordeal will be overcome and enjoy in expressing their personalities.
Thank You!
Good grief, people get het up over the Dumbest things.
I think these are beautiful and a wonderful way to bring a touch of whimsy and creativity to a necessary evil.
amen. had a former student that would have loved having one for her little boy.
These are SOOOO awesome!!! And I love that there aren’t any princesses….pick something stronger than that! Plenty of time for princess stuff later.
…some princess are quite strong and make great impacts – Princess Diana, and the Disney Princesses – Jasmine, Mulan, Merida to name a few.
Mulan is not a Disney princess… She was in a Disney movie but she was actually a real person so probably a better role model than the others.. Besides, she and the others you mentioned are apparently not part of the Disney Princess Club….
OMG! I signed it and it gave me these hideous avatar!! Seriously???? YIKES!!!
You can change it…
Here’s to taking a good thing and turning it in to princesses women having a bitch fest
ADORABLE! This is about doing something great for children , not to say awful things ….VERY SAD, SHAME ON YOU>>>>
The next time I hear a little boy being told he can be a Prince, I’ll say okay, talk princess crap to your daughters. Seriously ?? Boys are taught to dream about actual jobs. Girls are taught fantasy garbage.
No different than telling your son he can be a professional baseball player when he is at Tball level! It’s just being a kid! (And in most cases the chances are about the same) I have a girl and 3 boys and they can all fantasize while they are little what’s life without dreams? Relax we ARE talking about babies and each is entitled to their own opinion so come on RELAX! 🙂 awesome thing to do! Kudos to the artist! It’s awesome!
there’s nothing intrinsically wrong with princesses, except that all pink, all princess, all the time is extremely limiting to girls.
i think everyone should realize that Slap was stating their opinion and it just came out too harshly. sheesh guys lighten up a little.
Ehhh, go to Slap’s name and of the 26 comments they have ever posted, every single one is negative, harsh and rude.
I think he has a God given talent for making children smile !
he? last i checked Paula was still a female name…
Some princess crowns or fancy hairstyles would be nice for little girls <3
Not all little girls like princesses you know..
My granddaughter would want a Steelers helmet!
She makes those too 🙂
http://lazardo.smugmug.com/Art/Girlie-helmets/
princesses? really? I’d think we would start wanting our girls to be the queens, NOT princesses. Our girls don’t need saving. They need to realize their potential. Princess crap is NOT allowed in my house unless you are gay, and then, by all means be a princess!
A princes isn’t just a princess for life. If she is the first in line for a throne then when the king or queen passes on then she becomes the Queen. For example, if Prince William were a girl he would be Princess “whatever” and would someday inherit the throne as Queen.
Actually, your particular example is incorrect. At the time of William’s birth, the rule was that only first born sons could inherit the throne, but before William’s first born was born, they changed the law so if little Prince George had been a girl she would have been able to become Queen.
No. My wife is the queen of the house. If my children think otherwise, I make sure to put them back in their place.
Aside, fanatic helmets! That’s a great talent and a great cause.
It is a Princess because MOM is Queen. Dad is King and the son would be a prince.
Who says princesses need saving? That’s just a stereotype. One of my friends has a daughter that is very girly and loves princess stuff, make up, doing her nails etc… She also likes to beat up her brother.
Seriously, lighten up.
What does gay have to do with anything???
I think your girls need saving from that attitude.
Slap, your name fits. You could use one for that comment.
You don’t have to be rude. Your comment was uncalled for. If girls want to be princesses then let them be them. In my house you are free to be what you want to be.
she, slap, was probably abused.
a baby has no desire to be a princess, and these are for babies. so, a princess design is just a parent falling into societal girly stereotype… and i pity their child.
I agree Juanita. We spend so much time empowering our girls that we forget that being a princess, being a stay at home mom and other traditional roles are also valid choices. We tell them they can do anything a man does and be anything a man can be, which is true, but what if that’s not what they want. We need to let them choose to be anything then help them achieve that goal, even if its not the one we would have chosen for them.
I agree Juanita. We spend so much time empowering our girls that we forget that being a princess, being a stay at home mom and other traditional roles are also valid choices. We tell them they can do anything a man does and be anything a man can be, which is true, but what if that’s not what they want. We need to let them choose to be anything then help them achieve that goal, even if its not the one we would have chose for them.
I agree Juanita. We spend so much time empowering our girls that we forget that being a princesses, being a stay at home mom and other traditional roles are also valid choices. We tell them they can do anything a man does and be anything a man can be, which is true, but what if that’s not what they want. We need to let them choose to be anything then help them achieve that goal, even if its not the one we would have chose for them.