Shape Shifting

The city trilby, in graphite gray.  Notice the hat band's reflection--bright and noticeable, even though this one matches identically the felt.  

    Hats that can plausibly be worn are relatively few considering the vast array.  By plausibly, I mean both without attracting unwanted attention and, more importantly, without ironic intent.  This isn’t so surprising, really; a hat and one other key accessory is often all that’s required to convincingly evoke a well-known film or literary character--useful on occasions for which a costume is expected, but problematic the rest of the time. Put another way, if you do not wish to attract Guy Fawkes references, a black, wide-brimmed stovepipe hat is out of the question—even without the d’Artagnan beard.  

    But costume hats are hardly alone in attracting attention.  Consider the bowler, which on its famous features alone should be the easiest headgear for a man to adopt.  It is compact, free of immodest swoops or creases, practical in that it is stiffened.  It is also impossible to wear without eliciting remarks.  The same is only slightly less true of the homburg (the hat made famous by Anthony Eden and Poirot), and the top hat is largely irrelevant; the boater (a thickly plaited straw hat with a flat top and brim) is feasible, although comments involving Gatsby are inevitable, whereas the pith helmet (a military monstrosity made from tree bark; see Michael Caine in Zulu) is of course purely costume.  While few might bemoan the loss of these and others, the very idea that a number of shapes have traversed from wide use to obscurity illustrates the point: the hat world is shrinking.  What’s more, the phenomenon is infectious; just the other day I had to frown and shake my fist at a group of high-schoolers who heckled me for wearing a flat cap.  If this everyman’s cloth hat isn’t immune, what is?

    Strangely, the classic felt fedora shape goes relatively unpunished.  But, and I really must stress the point, proportion is absolutely critical.  Over the past several years, and with the expert guidance of Chicago’s inimitable Optimo, I have homed in on a style that seems to suit me.  It is a trilby, which is to say a less exuberant fedora, with a lowish crown, wide-set pinches that sweep back somewhat, a narrow ribbon band and a brim not more that an inch and seven eighths.  If this all sounds rather particular, it is; hat personalities have very little tolerance for variance, and what seem like slight changes in volume, height and placement can dramatically alter the effect.   This is just how it goes when something is worn so near to that most important signifier of person—the face.  Consider eyewear.   

    I think of the result as a “city trilby,” a sort of casual hat with country origins that has spruced itself up for a night on the town.  The style handily goes from denim and waxed cotton jackets right through to suits and overcoats.  In fact, so versatile is the shape I frequently envision it in several colors and finishes.  But here, I’m afraid, is where things can rather quickly go pear-shaped.  A shade even one increment in the wrong direction can throw things off considerably.  Oxblood sounds good, but is hazardously near plum, which, whatever anyone might argue, is purple.  Browns are safe, but make certain the shade doesn’t wash out the complexion.  Black is a characterless vacuum and the least flattering of all hat colors.  Charcoal and navy are infinitely better.  And then there is the hat band.  Because they are made from silk grosgrain, bands reflect rather than absorb light, the effect of which is conspicuousness.  Like a tie, they gleam, so be on high alert when selecting one.  I avoid bright, colorful and dramatically contrasting hat bands, opting instead for muted and dark bands very near in tone to the felt body.

    Ultimately, a hat is going to be noticed, and so any further gilding is not just unnecessary, but unwanted.  This is, perhaps, why many men have dropped the hat in favor of accessories like novelty socks; fine-tuning headwear is just too damn difficult, whereas an explosive item worn mostly out of site is an easy and safe way to suggest effort has been put into one's clothes.  How misguided; the richest moments of personal style require not just thought on behalf of the wearer, but the audience.

Heart Felt

    How strange it is that American Labor Day should have become the symbolic end of summer.  More than any other over the past two months, it is this weekend that my straw hats and linen clothes are needed.  And yet I am supposed to be thinking of wrapping these things up for the long, cold haul to Memorial Day?  It is true that only the strictest traditionalists follow to the letter summer and its gear.  But one can hardly deny, either, the melancholic top note that seems to waft in on even the muggiest breeze.  Summer is ending, it cries, and with it, the need for those appurtenances that only now seem relevant.

    One way of lessoning the ache is to spend some time in anticipation of coming seasonal changes.  If heavier clothing of tweed, flannel, cashmere or heavy worsted needs attention now is a good time to begin giving it.   These mends are easily done, though, and need perhaps a week at the most.  Shoes take longer; a local cobbler may need a month, but if your shoes are heading back to the original maker (often overseas), they better make the voyage chop chop—two or three months is normal.

    The most satisfying item to return to its maker, though, is a felt hat.  There is a simple reason for this: no matter how well you wield a brush or manage the steam from a kettle, your skills fall short of the hatter and his laboratory.  My hats return to Optimo around this time each year and when, in a few weeks, I am called to collect them, they appear as if newly made.  It is often not until I try each on do I believe they are mine; a good hatter will remove dust, marks and loose threads, but not, somehow, the molded memory of your head.

Capping Things Off

Standard flat cap in handsome glen check.  

    Like any hat-wearing man, I cycle through preferred shapes and configurations, favoring some, suddenly rejecting others.  Proper, full-sized fedoras appeal to me, but the reflected image is always slightly too near costume to have one made (even though I am confident Chicago's Optimo would nail the proportions).  In the same breath, I must admit I own the ultimate costume piece: a bowler, which strikes at the very core of masculine affections for headgear as a dashing, semi-formal stiffened helmet.  Sadly, bowlers are impossible to sincerely wear.  Trilbies are flattering and rakish, though and I’ve long wanted a soft Tyrolean, decorative rope and all.  

Linen cap folded and ready for a patch pocket.  

    But it's the humble flat cap that I reach for most often.  Like a bowler, the appeal has a duality born of action and style.  Unlike the bowler, though, the cap is a laborer’s hat—an inexpensive, straightforward design that can be deployed in an instant or folded and jammed in a jacket pocket as need arises.  The cap was borrowed by well-dressed gentlemen at the turn of the previous century as a casual, sporting alternative to the (often quite literally) stiff formal hats of felt expected of the upper classes.  I say borrowed because to this day the best versions are hardly made of scrap cloth; the shape might remain true to its modest origins, but the materials have moved up in the world.  

    Caps can be made of virtually any cloth.  One of my favorites is very fine linen lined with etherial mesh made by London’s Lock & Co.  As much as I depend upon my trusty straws, this is the head covering of choice when traveling.  I have held cashmere caps that caused me severe internal conflict; this simple shape so beautifully rendered had the same paradoxical charm of a dinner jacket made of some rugged tartan.  But tweed is really the correct cloth for a cap.  If a technical fabric-swathed disbeliever ever needed proof of the original performance cloth’s ability, I would encourage the wearing of a proper tweed cap for a week.  If his head doesn’t remain dry, warm and comfortable for the duration of the trial, I’ll eat my hat.

Field Survey

From top to bottom, a good start.

    Now that Memorial Day (in the US) has passed, any of the largely ignored restrictions regarding seasonal colors and materials are lifted.  White, cream, pastels, linen, raw silk, straw—these shouldn’t look out of place for the coming months.  This is particularly true of outdoor occasions, where whatever reluctance might remain in combining some of the above is assuaged by the prospect of standing in the grass with a Pimm’s.  Nevertheless, the garden party—for our purposes, a social gathering that takes place on or in the vicinity of a lawn—presents additional challenges to those who care about clothing and comfort.  

    I understand women have a whole genre of shoes specifically designed not to aerate the lawn, from flat sandals to stubby and flanged kitten heels.  A different concern lurks for men: moisture.  Grass, when green, is wet stuff, even if following several days without rain.  A prolonged stay sole-deep in the foliage can rather quickly soak through a shoe.  I avoid particularly thin-soled or lightly constructed shoes.  A double-soled monkstrap is good here, or, if you must, a rubber sole in the form of white or dirty bucks.  One word of caution: lighter colored leathers and suedes, spectators, and loafers with twill vamps are susceptible to grass stains.  

    That damp grass creates another problem: ground humidity.  I almost melted once at a charity benefit in mid-weight cotton drill trousers even though it was only in the mild mid-seventies.  If it is sunny, the relative humidity on the lawn will increase sharply.  Instead of cotton, a porous, lightweight wool or linen works better.  The former disperses the damp heat, the latter, at the expense of wrinkles, permits evaporation.  The most important aspect to a trouser in these conditions is porosity; any tightly woven cloth is going to allow rising humidity in without providing much of an escape.  The result is like being stewed from the waist down.  

Porosity is when you can see the garden through your trousers.  

    Porosity is important for your upper half as well.  A shirt in a cool-wearing open weave is important.  Royal oxford is a good compromise between comfort and opacity.  Voile is very cool but is fairly sheer—a problem for those with darker chest hair.  Your jacket should be made of one of the previously mentioned trouser cloths.  I say one of because, depending on the formality of the event, you’ll either be in a suit or odd elements.  Lightweight wool, especially something textured like Fresco, goes well with linen and, it could just be my imagination, but odd jacket and trouser combinations just seem cooler-wearing than suits.  

    Finally, if the sun is truly out, a straw hat is indispensable.  This can seem counterintuitive as it is another layer and the inside band might stick to your forehead.   But there are far worse symptoms of an exposed melon: a higher body temperature, the need to squint, sunburn.  If your head feels hot, simply remove your hat for a few moments and let evaporation do its thing; this will afford an opportunity to display your dexterity in the juggling of cocktail, hat and brow-mopping handkerchief. 

Drawing Straws

A Montecristi blocked into a derby shape.  For the dedicated collector.  Photographed at Optimo, Chicago.

    A head, unlike a waist, doesn’t fluctuate seasonally, and unless a person loses or gains a significant volume of hair, once a good measurement is on file with a hat-maker, the task of ordering really becomes a styling exercise.  With creases, dents, crowns, welts, brims, bindings, bands, and bows to consider, this is no trivial task, but compared to the multiple appointments necessary for a suit, a visit with a hatter is comparatively brief.  When your hatter is Optimo of Chicago, brevity is a shame; between all the dense felt, the spools of grosgrain and billowing steam, it is a particularly evocative place.  I have often been in the shop and witnessed other customers finding reasons to linger well-past orders have been placed.  Others might have noticed the same of me.  

    The hat wearer is considering straw at the moment.  At the top of that broad, warm-weather category is the Montecristi, the finely woven toquilla straw hats from the namesake Ecuadorian city.  Ultrafino qualities can run into the thousands and are highly collectible; the best I’ve handled was basically indistinguishable from linen.  Regular Montecristis are also beautiful, and less likely to cause a man-overboard scenario if blown from your head while boating.  Whether the finest or the entry level, Montecristis project a crisp, formal character; they can be worn casually, but seem to reward those unafraid to dress for an occasion.

    Further down the price spectrum is my personal favorite—the Milan (MY-lan).  This courser, golden weave has a variegated texture and a rich seagrass aroma.  Mine started life quite stiff but has softened and fuzzed over time, exchanging some of its blocked shape for a slouchy, well-worn character.  It is head, rather than hat-shaped and accompanies nothing more formal than a shirt worn open at the neck and loafers.  

    Milan seams to do best in a standard teardrop crown with a soft pinch and brown-toned hat band.  More exciting bands with tonal or contrasting stripes can be very handsome, but limit somewhat the hat’s compatibility with other clothes.  Montecristis classically have a black band; the contrast is perfect next to the pale cream straw, like a calligrapher’s bold underscore on a luxurious calling card.

 But don’t linger over these choices for too long; Memorial Day, the traditional start of straw season, approaches.

A well-loved, well-worn Milan.