Berets, Anyone?

[Daan]

Béret Vrai Basque

The béret Vrai Basque is, like the béret NIEBLA, one of the oldest beret labels still in production. Traditional French berets, available in both black and navy and a genuine French classic.

Interestingly, the Vrai Basque is made by two different companies, the label practically identical. Both Blancq-Olibet and Laulhère have the rights for this label and, it being such a well known and popular beret, I am sure both companies hate this situation.

There have been a few variations over the years, or decades, though. This is a selection of the various Vrai Basque labels I am aware off:

The picture below is an American Boy Scouts beret; don't know it's age, but looking at the bayadère lining, I would think it's 1940's.

At South Pacific Berets, apart from the black ones, I now stock Vrai Basques in marine/navy, in two diameters. Great berets, flexible and not too warm, perfect for this Indian Summer weather we're still experiencing here at the bottom of the world.

 

[Daan]

Interestingly, the Vrai Basque is made by two different companies, the label practically identical. Both Blancq-Olibet and Laulhère have the rights for this label and, it being such a well known and popular beret, I am sure both companies hate this situation.

And of course, I should have posted a picture of the Vrai Basque label as used by Laulhère. Here it is:

 

[Daan]

Great news to share with the wider beret community: very soon the new range of berets by 'Bérets Laulhère' will be available through South Pacific Berets (and nowhere else, for the first few months!).
It is by far the biggest news in the world of berets for decades: the completely new line of berets by French manufacturer Laulhère! But more than that, the way the manufacturer comes back from numerous years of struggling, is also a bit of a revolution in this traditional and predominantly conservative industry. What used to be BEATEX-Laulhère is now simply 'Laulhère', the original brand name since 1840 and the new Laulhère collection is truly innovative and daring.

The most significant news comes from the range of Bayadère berets, berets inspired by the interbellum's roaring twenties, or "années folles" ("crazy years"); Parisian jazz clubs and a hunger in people to express themselves, shed off the old conformative shells of society. The term bayadère has two meanings: "dancer", from the Portuguese "bailadeira", and "fabric in striped, bright colours". The Bayadère berets come in a variety of these multi-coloured linings (named Saint Jean, Isturitz and Hendaye), similar to those berets of the era that are now showcased in museums.

But, there is more. In line with the motto of The Beret Project (PEAKED CAP: FOR PEOPLE WHO DON'T DARE TO WEAR A BERET), Laulhère came up with a hat that sits somewhere between a peaked beret and a Basque beret, the Casquette - in both a standard and Bayadère edition.

The complete line of Laulhère berets will hit the market in September this year, but from mid-May already available through South Pacific Berets! South Pacific Berets will stock the Bayadères in a variety of diameters, both in black and navy, the Casquettes in various colours, with and without Bayadère-lining and the traditional Basque berets 'Basque Authentique" in various diameters in black and marine/navy.

 

[Daan]

The making of a DEER beret - 1

Asked for more information on the DEER Berets, Kongo-Shokai, the manufacturer, made this fantastic series of photographs: the whole manufacturing process of their berets.
Not only gives it a very detailed and intimate impression of how these berets are made, it also shows the artisan way how real hand made berets come into being.
To me, it also explains the (relatively high) cost of these berets; so much manual work, handling, checking, procedures...
I have said it before, there are not many berets that can compete with these DEER Berets on comfort, craftsmanship and eye for detail.
Highly recommended!

Beret knitting machine. Kongo-Shokai has four of these. With a maximum of 30 per machine per day, the total production is 120 berets per day.

Closing, or 'linking' the beret

The "rough" beret, with the closing thread (the "future txortena) visible

The washing machine that shrinks the berets in approximately 70-80 minutes

Pre- and post washing and drying

Dying of the berets

The individual beret is, after being dunked in hot water, wrapped in a wet cloth before going through the fulling machine (4 times), to compress the fibers

The fulling of the beret in progress

 

[Daan]

The making of a DEER beret - 2

Too many pictures to fit in one post...
Here is part 2:

The beret after fulling

Preparing the beret for brushing and shearing

Brushing of the beret

Shaving the beret

Before, and after shaving

Blocking the beret, pre-steaming

Beret blocks in the steamer

A string is attached to the outside of the beret, pre-steaming, to set the size of the beret

The beret post-steaming

Headband fitted, the final beret!

Many thanks to Yumiko for all her help!​

 

[alsendk]

Very, very interesting reading Daan, both about Tillac the artist, and your new information about the making of berets.
Have just come home from a week of holiday in Faro Portugal. I had my eyes open, and my camera ready for picturing any beret coming my way, but sadly not a single beret were to be seen anywhere.
But the sun was strong, and I had good use of my own.
picture to follow

 

[Daan]

Although there is a large majority of beret wearers with a preference for diameters between 27 and 30cm (10.6" and 11.8") diameter, there are extremes on both sides. I have published numerous posts on small berets like the Czech Radiovka and the Italian Basco Roma and even more on the large diameter Tartes.

The largest beret in the world, by Blancq-Olibet

The "Grande Piatto" is Italy's answer to the French Tarte, the Basque Txapeldun and the Argentinean Plato Grande.

Large (320mm/12.6") diameter berets in pure new wool. Extremely soft and comfortable. As a try-out, presently available in a very limited number at $ 40.00 only.

Have a look in the 'One-Off's Section' of South Pacific Berets.

 

[Italian-wiseguy]

I don't know if anyone already published it, but I found this old spanish documentary on beret-wearing Spaniards in a village in Castilla, "Gente de Boina" (People of the Beret)
http://www.zappinternet.com/video/VuMbVuhPam/Gente-de-Boina

also in a shorter, animated version (with english subtitles):
http://vimeo.com/34901653

I love the commentary!

 

[Moca]

I don't know if anyone already published it, but I found this old spanish documentary on beret-wearing Spaniards in a village in Castilla, "Gente de Boina" (People of the Beret)
http://www.zappinternet.com/video/VuMbVuhPam/Gente-de-Boina

also in a shorter, animated version (with english subtitles):
http://vimeo.com/34901653

I love the commentary!

know the video, but not with commentary. tried, but somehow the subtitles don't show. do i do something wrong?

 

[Italian-wiseguy]

Sorry, I probably posted a version without subtitles; this should work:
http://vimeo.com/58638421

 

[Italian-wiseguy]

Btw the animated version has been shortened and part of the commentary has gone; the original documentary began with a distinction between the Basques and Navarros, who use a larger, "artistic" beret, and the people of Castilla and La Mancha, who tend to usa smaller, "ascetic" beret.

I've read on spanish sites that the use of the "boina" (beret) has declined there like in the rest of Europe, and is seen by many as something for old men; except that Basques choose a large boina (a txapela) as a sign of ethnic pride.
Actually when I was in Spain years ago I saw as few berets as elsewhere (sadly), except that in the Pais Vasco where actually more people wore it... also remember people selling berets in the streets during the period of the encierro of Pamplona, red berets mostly... and also red berets on the other side of the french border, in Biarritz...

In Italy, where I'm living, everytime I go out I meet at least one other person (and not the same one ) wearing a basque beret, other than me; maybe we can reverse the trend

 

[Daan]

Btw the animated version has been shortened and part of the commentary has gone; the original documentary began with a distinction between the Basques and Navarros, who use a larger, "artistic" beret, and the people of Castilla and La Mancha, who tend to usa smaller, "ascetic" beret.

I've read on spanish sites that the use of the "boina" (beret) has declined there like in the rest of Europe, and is seen by many as something for old men; except that Basques choose a large boina (a txapela) as a sign of ethnic pride.
Actually when I was in Spain years ago I saw as few berets as elsewhere (sadly), except that in the Pais Vasco where actually more people wore it... also remember people selling berets in the streets during the period of the encierro of Pamplona, red berets mostly... and also red berets on the other side of the french border, in Biarritz...

In Italy, where I'm living, everytime I go out I meet at least one other person (and not the same one ) wearing a basque beret, other than me; maybe we can reverse the trend

You made my day, Italian Wiseguy! I know the video well, but never had the commentary translated. It's great, and now I'm hungry for the translation of the full version (any Spanish speakers willing to volunteer?).

You describe a sad reality, about the decline of the beret (or "real" hats in general, maybe). But I also see some light: the production of Basque berets is on the increase again in France, after many years of steady decline. There is also an increase of beret wearers among the younger French, the "bobos", (or bourgeois-bohème), are buying berets as a sign of authenticity and a link to rural France, where their grandparents probably lived and worked. The wearing of boinas is still common on the Argentinean campo and if my sales through South Pacific Berets are anything to go by, I see a steady growth of American, Australian and European beret wearers.
And, most surprising to myself, over the last couple of years, I regularly come across New Zealanders wearing a beret! Your comments how you generally meet an Italian beret wearer each day is another comfort, like the interest in a forum such as this.

 

[1280almas]

Not translated yet, sorry I don't have skill to translate it properly.
"Las boinas de los vascos y navarros son anchas, aldoneras. Las de los manchegos y castellanos son más bien ceñidas y aplanadas. Aquellas son boinas de gentes atléticas, comilonas y cantantes. Las de estos de frugales, terruñeros, silenciosos y ascetas.
Con el tiempo, las boinas se ponen color paja, color ala de mosca. Hay parvas de boinas que al ser lavadas por primera vez por la lluvia, se las comen las hormigas y les brotan amapolas.
En los entierros, todos los hombres llevan luto, al menos en la cabeza.
Hay gañanes que mantienen el honor de sus boinas como el propio. Y como cuidan de su mujer cuidan del rabo de su bolete.
Tal vez gusten tanto las boinas y parezcan tan vivas y domésticas, porque tienen el rabillo corto que en los días aciagos mueve el viento.
Si todos los habitantes del pueblo dejaran un día sus boinas entre el casino, la iglesia y el ayuntamiento, toda la plaza parecería una boina gigante."
Villager:
"Y con todo lo que digan Pamplona, el encierro de Tordesillas es mucho más bonito, porque suben por esta calle -es más bonito el de Cuellar- na ni Cuellar ni San Cuellar, como esto no hay ninguno, yo he corrido varios -pero en Cuellar- se baja usted ahí abajo y ahí ya ve usted los pinares -sí- pues ya ve usted subir el encierro hasta aquí y si tiene usted valor pues sube usted delante o detrás del encierro.
Antes era costumbre ponerle banderillas después pero luego lo quitaron porque hubo un señor que era protector de animales en Madrid, el conde de no sé cuanto que debía dormir... ¿Quién? Era el conde o el marqués de no sé cuanto, era el presidente -el conde bailén- de la protectora de animales yo creo que le gustaba más el perrito con la cadenita..."

 

[Daan]

Not translated yet, sorry I don't have skill to translate it properly.

Excellent! Thanks very much for writing it all down, 1280almas! Google doesn't do fantastic translations, but it does give you a good sense of what it is all about.

 

[Jack Patch]

The only time I wore a beret was back in my college days with the Army R.O.T.C. They took about a dozen of us and put us in an advanced course for those interested in Airborne, Rangers, or Special Forces. We had to standard black berets. All went well till I found out I was color blind. Really ticked off my guard units s-3 officer. He wanted to send me to sniper school.

 

[Italian-wiseguy]

I'll try, but some native spanish speaker please correct me!

"The berets of the basques and the navarros are wide, aldoneras (?). The ones of the manchegos and castellanos are tighter and flatted. Those are berets of an athletic people, who like to eat and sing; these are of a frugal, land-based, silent and ascetic people.
With time, berets come to be the same color of the straw, the color of the wing of a fly. There are piles of berets that, when are washed by the rain for the first time, are already eaten by ants and butterflies born form them.
During funerals, all the men are wearing mourning clothes, at least on their heads. There are workers that keep the honor of their berets just as their own. And they care about the wick of their beret just as they care of their woman. Maybe they like berets so much, and these looks so alive and domestic, because they had a short wick, that in a cloudy day is moved by the wind. If all the inhabitants of the village, one day, will left their berets between the casino, the church and the city hall, all the plaza would appear like a giant beret"
I think that here begins the part already translated in the shorter video;
than there are the voices of the villagers, kept speaking between themselves:
"And even if they say Pamplona, the encierro of Tordesillas is a lot more beautiful, because they go on this street- the one in Cuellar is more beautiful- na nor Cuellar nor San Cuellar, there is no other like this one, and I ran in a lot of them- but in Cuellar- you go so down there and there you see the pine woods- yes- then you see the encierro arriving till here and if you have courage you can go before or after the encierro. They were used to put banderillas, but they quit doing it because of someone who was a protector of animals in Madrid- the count of I don't know what, who had to sleep- who? he was the count or marquis of I dunno, he was the president- the count bailèn (?)- of the Protection of animals, and I think he liked a lot more a little doggy with a tiny leash..."

Btw the worlds of the commentary are of Francisco Garcia Pavòn, a native of Tomelloso (the village in the documentary) and a writer whose works include a book called "El jardìn de la boinas" or "The garden of the berets"; for what I could see on internet, he liked to put berets in his novels and was a tenacious beret-wearer.

ciao!

 

[Daan]

I'll try, but some native spanish speaker please correct me!

Great work, thanks very much!

 

[Daan]

Photographer W.E. Smith

William Eugene Smith (1918 – 1978) was an American photojournalist known for his refusal to compromise professional standards and his brutally vivid World War II photographs.

W. Eugene Smith, Hitachi, Japan, 1962
As a correspondent for Ziff-Davis Publishing and then Life, Smith entered World War II on the front lines of the island-hopping American offensive against Japan, photographing U.S. Marines and Japanese prisoners of war at Saipan,Guam, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa. On Okinawa, Smith was hit by mortar fire. After recovering, he continued at Life and perfected the photo essay from 1947 to 1954.

Pittsburgh Steel
Smith joined the Magnum photo agency in 1955, after severing ties with Life. There he started his project to document Pittsburgh.

In January 1972, Smith was attacked by Chisso employees near Tokyo, in an attempt to stop him from further publicizing the Minamata disease to the world. Although Smith survived the attack, his sight in one eye deteriorated. Smith and his Japanese wife lived in the city of Minamata from 1971 to 1973 and took many photos as part of a photo essay detailing the effects of Minamata disease, which was caused by a Chisso factory discharging heavy metals into water sources around Minamata.

Three Generations of Welsh Miners (1950) by W.E. Smith
Complications from his longterm consumption of drugs, notably amphetamines (taken to enable his workaholic tendencies), and alcohol led to a massive stroke, from which Smith died in 1978. He is buried in Crum Elbow Cemetery, Pleasant Valley, New York.

 

[Daan]

Thanks for the effort Italian-wiseguy!:eusa_clap
It's poppy intead of butterflies, is a plant that grows everywhere.
View attachment 797
Agamenón was a famous comic in the 70's, it's full of berets.

A yes, Agamenón - a great advocate for berets. Interestingly, the beret does extremely well in comics, and not only French and Spanish comics. Robert Crump is one:

Crumb was a founder of the underground comix movement and is regarded as its most prominent figure. Though one of the most celebrated of comic book artists, Crumb's entire career has unfolded outside the mainstream comic book publishing industry.
Many berets feature in the comics series "No Pasarán" and "A Jew in Communist Prague", by Italian author Vittorio Giardino.

Then there are the Smurfs (French: Les Schtroumpfs), a Belgian comic and television franchise centered on a group of small blue fictional creatures called Smurfs, created and first introduced as a series of comic characters by the Belgian comics artist Peyo (pen name of Pierre Culliford) in 1958. In 1998, writer Marc Schmidt wrote a parody article citing the Smurfs as an example of the impact of socialism in continental European culture. The red-capped Papa Smurf does have a strong resemblance to Karl Marx, but there is more controversy surrounding Smurfs: the mean wizard Gargamel looks identical to the portrayal of 'the Wandering Jew' by the Nazi's and, the aggressive mean Smurfs are obviously black... Despite the Smurfs liking for a barettina like hat, I did find a few pictures of berets on the little blue beasts too.

Javi Cabrero is a Spanish comic book character from Vitoria (Extremadura), permanently wearing a black vest and Basque beret.

Javi Cabrero's stories are set in La Vera North of Cáceres. Because of the financial crisis and economic hardship, Cabrero has become unemployed, after his father had to sell the goats.
Quick & Flupke (Quick et Flupke in French) is a comic book series by Hergé (famous for The Adventures of Tintin) about two street urchins in Brussels named Quick and Flupke. The two boys unintentionally cause trouble, leading to annoyance with their parents and the police.

[video=youtube;9KlnEP2P3k8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9KlnEP2P3k8[/video]

Another Belgian comic character is Benedict Steelbreaker, by the same creator of the Smurfs, Peyo. Benoît Brisefer is a blond-haired little boy who always wears a beret, a blue scarf, a red jacket and black shorts. He is very polite, honest and well-mannered, works hard at school and likes to help people in need. He hates crime and injustice and has an intense dislike for firearms.

What makes him really exceptional, though, is that he possesses superhuman strength: he can lift tremendous weights, leap huge distances and run extremely fast. However, if he catches a cold he loses his strength and becomes "the well-behaved little boy that every parent would love to have."

And then there is Superdupont is a French comic created in 1972 as a parody of both Superman and French national attitudes (or, rather, their caricatural perception outside and inside France).

And there are many more, but I have reached the max number of pictures for this post... Later more.

 

[Daan]

More on comics & berets...

Dr. Osamu Tezuka (1928-1989) was a Japanese graphic novel author, or manga artist and very well known for wearing his Basque beret. Tezuka’s works had tremendous impact on Japanese culture, literature and film, especially during the post-war period.

His work focused on the themes of the progress, technology, environmentalism, tolerance, and reincarnation, and his messages of hope and calls for greater social responsibility have made him one of the most respected cultural figures of 20th century Japan.
Mort & Phil (Spanish: Mortadelo y Filemón) is one of the most popular Spanish comics series, published in more than a dozen countries. It appeared for the first time in 1958 in the children's comic-book Pulgarcito drawn by Francisco Ibáñez.

Initially, they were private detectives operating as Mortadelo y Filemón, Agencia de Información, but now both serve as secret agents in the Técnicos de Investigación Aeroterráquea (TIA is the Spanish word for "aunt", a spoof on CIA, not The Man from U.N.C.L.E. which was translated in Spain as "El hombre de C.I.P.O.L") which translates into "Air-Earth Investigation Technicians".
If I ever had a hero role-model as a child, it must be Corto Maltese, the character created by Italian comic book writer Hugo Pratt.

Corto's father is an English sailor from Cornwall, his mother a gypsy from Gibraltar. As a rebel, he mostly sides with the oppressed, with Indians, Irish revolutionaries against the British, Russians fighting against the Czarist system. Pratt often combines fact with fiction, and sets the actions of his characters against some true historical crisis. Interestingly, Pratt's works never took off in the Anglo-Saxon world, but were and still are big in France, Spain, Italy, Yugoslavia and many other European and South American countries.
And last, for now, Oliver B. Bumble (Olivier B. Bommel in Dutch) is a fictional anthropomorphic bear and one of the two main characters, the other being Tom Puss (Tom Poes in Dutch) in an originally Dutch series of comic books bearing the name of either one main characters in their name, written by Marten Toonder.

Sir Olivier Berendinus Bommel is a gentleman of good standing, for whom money is no object and Lord of Castle Bommelstein. Sir Bumble is very class-conscious, but not unlikable. He drives a modest car, de "Oude Schicht" (the Old Flash), en dresses very modest in no more than a checkered coat. One other character in the Bumble comics is painter Terpen Tijn (Turpentine); a bohemian who lives for art and has no concern to bourgeois pettiness. He is sloppy dressed and wears a black beret, of course. He applies his paint with great energy onto the canvas, spreading "strong vibrations". It is said that Toonder based Terpen Tijn on Dutch painter Karel Appel.