Put a Lid on It
Hat shops have weathered fashion's favor and disregard to come out on top during hard times.
By Michael E. Ross for MSN Local Edition
Back in the day -- "the day" being decades ago -- hats were a given of any man's wardrobe, an apparel item that combined form and function at an affordable price. It's a fact reflected in photographs of breadlines during the Great Depression: One thing that millions of unemployed American men had in common -- besides being jobless -- were the hats on their heads.
Headwear began to fall from favor with men in the early '60s, as longer hair styles and more casual fashions came to the fore.
Recently, though, hats have made an impressive comeback, becoming for many an indispensable adjunct to the everyday wardrobe, while easily adding a dash of dignity and polish. For hat devotees, the aggressively casual baseball cap just won't do any more (even New York Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez kicks back with a proper topper when he's not on the field). Today's styles run the gamut, from casual, colorful "stingy-brim" hats that speak to a hipster esthetic to the classic fedora, that staple of bygone eras, simpler times and Humphrey Bogart movies.
Trends often take their cues from the entertainment world, and the resurgence of hats for men is no exception. Entertainers like Samuel L. Jackson, Justin Timberlake, Johnny Depp and Brad Pitt have often been spotted sporting brims; hats are worn by the alpha-male characters in the popular cable series "Mad Men," set in the early-to-mid-1960s, pretty much the high-water era of male headgear in America.
Here are three sources across America -- the custom hatmaker, the neighborhood retailer and the international reseller -- where you can get your hat on.
Optimo's handcarved hats
Located on the South Side of Chicago, the Optimo Hat Company lays claim to being "the world's finest producer of custom made hats," and is proud of its handmade, old-school approach to hat making in a time when, according to Jack Lambert (former vice president of the Headwear Association), only 20 percent of hats sold in the United States are actually made here.
Going by the price of its hand-sewn, hand-finished headwear, Optimo's clientele sits at the high end of the discretionary-spending spectrum. Prices for Optimo straw hats start at around $400, felt hats at $600. These custom orders take about a month to complete. But the time to create an Optimo hat from scratch -- and the scratch required to buy one -- hasn't hindered the company's business.
Optimo's customers past and present include actor Andy Garcia, Chicago blues icon Buddy Guy and rocker Jack White of the White Stripes: "We make some really wild hats for him," Graham said. The late blues legend John Lee Hooker ("I met him in 1996 and after that we did all his hats from then on," Thompson said proudly) and Bernie Mac, the actor and comedian whose hats were very much a part of his persona ("He was a regular, really nice to all our customers," Thompson said) are other dapper gents once among the company's client roster.
Optimo creations have graced the silver screen, too. The company made 82 hats for use in Sam Mendes' film "Road to Perdition," set during the Depression and starring Tom Hanks and Paul Newman. Johnny Depp and Christian Bale (plus a raft of extras) wore Optimo hats in last year's John Dillinger biopic "Public Enemies." "We did about 100 hats for that movie," Thompson tallies.
Thompson sees generational trends among his hat sales. "We have an incredibly diverse clientele," he said. "The 20 and 30-year-olds tend toward lower crowns, shorter brims, 'hipster' styles. It's also great to see the younger guys recognize how totally cool our seasoned hat wearers are."
Optimo's custom work tends toward "fedoras with stingy brims, but we're also moving lots of porkpies and derbies," Thompson says. "As hats get more popular, many of our clients are going after more individualistic styles."
And countering capitalism's core tenets, Thompson would rather do less business with fewer customers than sell hats to buyers just riding the coolness wave.
"Years ago, this happened with cigars. People enjoyed it because it was trendy, not because of who they were. All of a sudden, you had all these schmoes smoking cigars. We're doing well in our niche but some of this is just like with trendy things in general."
A fixture in downtown Seattle since the Great Depression, this store has seen multiple owners since Byrnie Utz (rhymes with "shoots") opened it on Union Street in 1934. Stetsons, Borsalinos and Kangols are among practically any hat you might fancy in a range of styles and colors, from Irish newsboy caps to bowlers, from top hats (a fixture of steampunk subculture) to porkpies, to the fedoras still favored by the store's older clientele.
"The biggest client for sales right now is the 20-to-30-somethings," Vice President Shawn Ferry said. Most are going for "the small brim, the stingy-brim fedoras, the late-50's look with the inch-and-a-half, two-inch brims. That's really the trend at the moment.
"But you definitely still get the guys who've been coming in here for 20 years and they want the same hat they wanted 20 years ago, more from the '30s or '40s with the wider [2 and 3/8-inch] brim."
The price of admission varies widely by style and material. Byrnie Utz sells Irish wool caps at prices between $65 and $75; sturdier Irish newsboys go for $100. Rakish Borsalinos cost between $150 and $450, while classic summer-weight flat Kangol caps are priced from about $30. And if you're in a mood to indulge your inner Sam Spade, the legendary fedoras sell for about $50 (wool felt), up to $150 (fur-felt), to just over $500 for supple beaver.
But all this style has a more practical purpose according to Ferry: "As far as the utilitarian view, you get a lot of people coming in [knowing that] skin cancer is becoming a bigger issue," he said. "People are a lot more conscious about trying to stay away from the sun and not getting too much. Hats have become something that's functional."
A relatively cool summer in the Northwest coupled with the wider lackluster economy took a bit of a toll on Ferry's recent sales. "On the whole it wasn't a blockbuster summer for us; we're definitely down from last year, when there were record-breaking temperatures," he said. "We were doing well compared to years before that."
By sheer volume, Dorfman Pacific is a prime mover in the world of hat sales, claiming on its Web site to be "the largest full-line, in-stock headwear and handbag company in the world." Started in Oakland, Calif., in 1921 in a 5,000-square-foot facility, the company now boasts a global clientele of retailers serviced by staff at a 283,000-square-foot location in Stockton. In addition to making its own headwear, Dorfman also resells the name-brand headwear of a wide range of hatmakers at by-appointment showrooms in cities including Boston, Dallas, Denver and Honolulu.
Douglas Highsmith, the president, owner and CEO of Dorfman Pacific, thinks the passion for headwear is being driven by our affinity for pop culture and a youthful outlook.
Playing on that appeal for all things cool, the Dorfman product line includes headwear easily associated with certain people in the public eye: from Panama straws (think Jimmy Buffett) to western hats (à la Toby Keith), from the "Sydney Washed Twill Outback" (Crocodile Dundee comes to mind) to the seven-inch top hat classic, the "Mad Hatter" (Slash, your hat is ready).
"The resurgence in headwear is primarily more weighted to the under-35 crowd," Highsmith said. But for Highsmith, regardless of demographic, the peak in sales is consistent with something that for him represents business as usual. "Whenever there's a recession, accessories sell better," he said. "A guy won't buy a suit, but he'll buy hats or cufflinks instead of buying something more expensive. It's easy to go buy a hat or a tie, and it doesn't cost as much."
And in spite of the recession dogging Americans, 2010 has been a very good year. "We're having significant double-digit sales increases over last year," Highsmith said, "which in a recession is pretty damn good."
Highsmith said the company's big sellers include hats with the fedora look and hats with a smaller brim, "about an inch and a quarter," favored by younger buyers. The company also sells fedoras inspired by the Indiana Jones films, and soon will offer the Sinatra collection, a line of fedoras "representational and inspired by Mr. Sinatra's wardrobe." Highsmith said the Sinatra-inspired headwear "will start shipping in early November," the same time a new line of hats inspired by legendary rock guitarist Carlos Santana are expected in department and specialty stores.
Reference:
Put a Lid on It - 1 - MSN Local Edition