How did you start wearing hats?

[moustache]

Been wearing for years!!

I have been wearing fine hats for about 20 years. I currently have a Borsalino brown fedora,black Homburg,black bowler,A Borsalino Gruppo tweed fedora and a Pendleton grey fedora.Love them all but especially the Borsalino tweed.

JD

 

[Jack Scorpion]

My story is very ... not touching at all.

I don't even remember liking hats when I was younger. When I got to college I wore birkenstocks, jeans and white T-Shirts. In HS, I wore baseball related clothing. I had never seen any film noir movies, or really any old movies that weren't Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn as my mom watched TCM at home. I had never even seen Indiana Jones.

As a college freshman, I was at a local hat store and just trying on hats for fun. I loved the color green, so when I saw this one wool green fedora for 20 bucks, I was a little curious. I tried it on and asked a friend of mine -- whatya think? Can I pull this off??

My friend looked back at me and paused for a moment. Actually, yes you can -- he said, which was unexpected. I had just been joking and I'd always been the clown of the group, usually the butt of many jokes. In fact -- my friend continued -- you look damn good in that hat.

20 bucks -- heck, so I bought it. I was afraid to wear it most of the time, but it really grew on me, so I started to wear it at least once a week. People kept comparing me to Indiana Jones, so finallly, I watched the movies. I didn't get obsessed with it, but I definitely found a greater appreciation of The Fedora when I watched it. Since then, any and all lead characters in a story, in my mind, wore fedoras. It just made sense. (Although, actually, it was Belloq's panama in Raiders that really struck me.)

I started buying more fedoras. Gray, brown... all wool, 25 bucksish. In Sophomore year, as I grew more curious about fedoras in general, I came across The Fedora Lounge in a search engine. I lurked and read stuff, only in the hat section, for a good while. I never left.

My favorite movies at the time were Blade Runner, The Big Lebowski and The Blues Brothers. It didn't really hit me right away that all three movies were throwbacks to a different style of cinema and/or style. Finding my place in the cinemafan world happened on its own and over my college years I became one of the biggest movie fans I know -- Film Noir became my main passion.

Though my hatlove arose independently from Noir, they ultimately collided in my Junior Year -- then in my senior year, I was a scholar of the genre and wore vintage fedoras like it was my business. Now fedoras are so natural to me that they are just another type of hat I wear next to baseball caps (which I still wear habitually). And they always will be.

 

[Phil]

I started wearing hats just because I thought the looked cool.

 

[Hamandbacon]

A Practical Start

Hi everyone,

I am new to the Lounge, but have been wearing hats for about the last ten years. I have always worn caps, and shortly before we were married, my wife bought me a leather outback-style hat to travel in during the Fall Festivals around here. Since then, I have enjoyed the protection, warmth, and especially the shielding from the rain a good brim has to offer. I have to walk with a walking cane, and a good hat and rain jacket give me use of both hands (Look Ma!-- no umbrella). More importantly though, I have always loved the classic and retro style.

Thanks !

Jeff

 

[deanglen]

Hi everyone,

I am new to the Lounge, but have been wearing hats for about the last ten years. I have always worn caps, and shortly before we were married, my wife bought me a leather outback-style hat to travel in during the Fall Festivals around here. Since then, I have enjoyed the protection, warmth, and especially the shielding from the rain a good brim has to offer. I have to walk with a walking cane, and a good hat and rain jacket give me use of both hands (Look Ma!-- no umbrella). More importantly though, I have always loved the classic and retro style.

Thanks !

Jeff

Greetings, friend. Not only does the Lounge provide encouragement for classic and retro style, the friendships take on a vintage quality as well. Glad to be in the same club with you!

dean

 

[duggap]

Since sun damage is cumulative and I had accumulated quite a bit as a golfer, I have had to have several skin cancers cut off my ugly face. So I went straw. It took six months to get used to seeing my face under a lid but I got used to it and liked it. Now I feel totally undressed to go outside without a hat on. So I have been buying some winter hats based on advise I have read from here. Thanks to all. Duggap

 

[Lord Jagged]

Panamas first...

For me it was a panama hat on my first holiday when my daughter was one. I think i wanted to live up to the suit and tie I was wearing at work and the young family I was proud of. The Panama was cool enough to keep the sun off and looked the part. I graduated to a fedora in winter and never looked back!

 

[Hammelby]

Thanks grandpa

Well, i inherited my grandfathers eightpence (bless his soul), and it is thanks to this hat that im uncurable 30's fanatic

Some month ago i bought my first fedora in an antique shop,
now i wear it to work with a tie.

 

[upr_crust]

Male pattern baldness made hats a necessity . . .

. . . but access to "real" hats (living in NYC) made a necessity a virtue.

I've been wearing fedoras now for over a decade, at least in the cooler months, and have branched out to "Russian diplomat" hats in the dead of winter (i.e. those fur-covered things such as the current president of Afghanistan wears - they do work well for travel, as they fold and pack well, as opposed to fedoras, which don't travel well in a plane, certainly).

 

[czack]

I always liked the ivy/driver's caps, even as a kid. As I grew older I expanded my repetoire to include Dorfman Pacific "Aussie-style" hats. (Yea, yea they were wool, but I was just a kid. OK, late teens, early twenties.) At about 30ish I decided to get a "real hat" and bought a Stetson Temple. I've learned a lot since then, I mainly stick to Akubras.

 

[Havana Joe]

What drew you to dress hats?

I always liked hats. As a kid I wore cowboy hats, cop hats, captain's hats, etc. I guess I was always in search of an adventure. When Raiders of the Lost Ark came out it had a big effect on me. I was also in awe that he used a whip: I had started using one at about eight years old when my parents bought me one, but that's another story.

Havana Joe

 

[Byrne Sherwood]

I started off with caps at a young age-railroad engineer cap was my go to hat. When I was about 5 years old, I was invited to be a bat-boy for a little league team and was elated at the prospect because I would get a cap with the uniform. Actually, they were out of hats and I wore my engineer cap. I expect that my dad wearing a cap or beret every day (he was a soldier) influenced my attitudes. For a few years, grey leather kepi was my cap of choice.
Then along came Jones. Like many others on the forum, I was strongly influenced by Indy. I got a fedora at Disneyland at about 10 or 11 y.o. and many hats followed-more fedoras, a Panama, straw boaters, berets, campaign hats, westerns, anything I could get my hands on. Headgear was what I spent Christmas or birthday money on.
Over the years I have fluctuated in taste and in inclination to don a chapeau. Bursts of minimalism and/or limited living space have caused purges of hats and footwear (another fetsh of mine). I now have about ten hats and about as many caps and try to keep my collection under control and limited to what I will actually wear.

 

[GeniusInTheLamp]

For me, it actually started in high school, when I took a class trip to Germany. I purchased a Tyrolean hat, which I wore regularly at marching band practice and on band trips. When I went to college, the hat stayed in my closet, and my interest in hat-wearing was put on hold.

Fast-forward to about 1996. My grandmother had found a couple of my grandfather's old hats (he had passed away in 1994), and gave them to me. I thought I looked good in them, so I wore them to work every day. Then another old interest of mine resurfaced - classic movies. I began to appreciate the fashion sense of the people in the movies, and applied some of that to my own personal style.

So far, the only person who has criticized me for my fondness for hats has been my grandmother - the person who got me back into wearing hats in the first place! lol

 

[upr_crust]

Necessity was the mother of invention . . . .

. . . also the reason for me to start wearing hats.

I started to wear hats on a regular basis when in my latter 30's, when my male pattern baldness made winters too cold to go without a hat, but I opted to start donning fedoras instead of baseball caps because I think that baseball caps with suits are an abomination (I used to have to be dressed in suits for work - still wear them when it's not too hot or wet out).

 

[Honduran]

Getting thin on top

I was never a fan of hats, wearing them only when necessity (meaning our frigid Canadian winters) made them mandatory. Even then, would a wool toque qualify as a hat? With increasing age comes growing wisdom, and when combined with a thinning hairline, the summer sun necessitated a move to ball caps. Now I'll only wear a ball cap in the rain, when I walk my dog, as the poor beast is umbrellaphobic. I began the transition to Panama's and Fedora's somewhat late in life (I'm a year and a half past 50), and spend much time wishing this "bug" had bit me earlier, so I'd have amassed a much larger collection by now. I feel "dressed" when I go out with a hat on - it's exhilerating. I'll never understand those who only wear their's indoors!

Also, as I've written about previously, when I look at myself in the mirror today, I see my father staring back at me. I never saw my father without a hat, and I suppose wearing mine makes the bond somehow more tangible - like father, like son.

 

[Radioflyer]

I also was never a hat fan though I do believe that the 30's and 40's were the acme of American fashion. My granddad used to farm with a hat and tie on..a common sight back then. I always admired that.

Being a history buff, I was a Civil War reenactor for about 15 years and wore slouchhats, soon to discover how utilitarian they were...keeping the sun of my eyes and off my neck and keeping the rain at bay. Being an avid flyfisherman, I'm always on the stream/lake in the sun fishing and a brimmed hat fits the bill...looks cool too!

So I've discovered the practical (and 'cool') application for brimmed hats. I now own a couple Akubras (Snowy River with cut down brim and a Jackaroo-neatest hat I've ever owned) and am saving for my Adventurbuilt...someday!

rf

 

[Manny Tavares]

Hello all. My name is Manny Tavares and this is my first post on The Fedora Lounge. I've have gotten so tired of baseball caps that I want something much more substantial on my head. So I've been interested in trying to find the right hat for my head. I tend to like pork pie hats as they seem to fit my personal character at work, while a nice beaver fedora at night seems appropriate from November to March. I look forward to more posts and interactions with all of you.

Manny

 

[K.D. Lightner]

Welcome, Manny -- I am sure you will find all sorts of expertise, advice, inspiration and camaraderie here.

Glad to know you are tired of baseball caps and ready for the big-time.

When did you start wearing hats, or has it always been caps?

karol

 

[dzacca]

Hi everybody,

my account has just been activated. I luckily found this forum a few days ago surfing the web.

I always loved hats, but I started wearing them only 2 years ago. My first hat was an oiled cotton cow boy hat. I currently use it in rainy days during spring and summes. Now I'm waiting for a new Stetson' Sardis that I should receive in a few days. I hope I made a good choice for an hat to use everyday.



Diego

 

[art92101]

When Did I start wearing hats?

Being born in the 50s, I grew up with many hat images. My dad was a welder and had a personal principal of never looking like a slob. Even though he was a welder he came home everyday in a clean uniform and he wore a straw fedora. He had played professional baseball in Mexico and would occassionally wear a ball cap. But mostly it was a fedora. Additionally, since he was from the rancho he wore and appreciated cowboy hats. He was wearing a re-bashed Open Road for as long as I can remember. He also knew and performed rope tricks...much like Monty Montana ( anybody remember him?) So I was transfixed by TV cowboy images, re-enforced by my dad's cowboy/fedora ways. As a kid I always wore a hat and since my dad looked pretty good in a hat I assumed I did too. Around my teen years i began to venture from ball caps. In college, when someone gave me a vintage fedora that fit and the college girls said I looked either like Ricky Ricardo or Bogart...that was all it took to convince me fedoras were a sure bet. Thanks for the site. it is a very good one. It helps me understand and appreciate the vintage stuff.