Lock & Co. Video

[navarre_au]

CNN Video - Hats back in Style - Lock & Co

My wife noticed on the CNN website this morning a video about hats - so being the lovely person she is - she mentioned it to me

Nothing groundbreaking in it - but its an interesting quick visit to Lock & Co in England

http://edition.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_c4#/video/business/2013/03/28/qmb-pkg-quest-bowler-hats.cnn

 

[Tomasso]

One of my favorite hat shops.

 

[HungaryTom]

Dear navarre_au, It was fun to see this video, thanks to you and your wife. Happy Easter and welcome to the lounge! Cheers HT

 

[The Good]

Thanks! I believe Lock & Co. also made the trilby hats that Sean Connery wore as James Bond, although we got to see them mostly tossed on the hat rack.

 

[Alive'n'Amplified]

Terrific video! That guy is sooooo English!!

 

[Walt]

Thanks for sharing the video. I have a few of the Locke hats from the 60's/70's and they were better hats than many of the period. They had quite good quality leather sweats for the era.

 

[TomS]

Thanks for sharing!

 

[Blackthorn]

Cool video! I have a Lock and Co hat, and I like it a lot, nice to know they are not a relic of the past. I'd love to visit that store some day. I've never been to England...

 

[Stray Cat]

Lovely video. Thank you for sharing! :thumb:

 

[cookie]

http://the-shoe-aristocat.blogspot.com.au/search/label/double monk

Pitti Hats 2013

 

[mikespens]

Current Lock & Co lids are fairly expensive based on their website. I picked up a really used 70-80's example off Etsy and found it to be of high quality and worthy of reblock/refurb by BSHW. It's pretty much my go to hat now.

 

[Bird Lives]

I saw this on youtube and thought maybe someone would enjoy it...Pardon me if it has already been posted before...
[video=youtube_share;NeOF0UCZ2DI]http://youtu.be/NeOF0UCZ2DI[/video]

 

[Bird Lives]

Ran across this today....I thought it was a very good Interview with Sue Simpson, MD of Lock & Co hatters.
- See more at: http://www.merchantandmakers.com/lock-and-co-hatters/#sthash.Vb6qMNnA.dpuf

 

[stratcat]

Ran across this today....I thought it was a very good Interview with Sue Simpson, MD of Lock & Co hatters.
- See more at: http://www.merchantandmakers.com/lock-and-co-hatters/#sthash.Vb6qMNnA.dpuf

Great find, thanks for sharing.

 

[RJR]

Very interesting,thanks.

 

[Bird Lives]

I think this interview with Sue Simpson has addressed some important issues....
One, Lock & Co. Hats for the most part are made in England....Ive been hearing they were now made in Czech Rep. or by Borsalino...So this changes that I believe...

Also, I've been told that any Lock & Co. Hats at Brooks Bros. Must be old because Brooks Bros has stopped doing business with Lock...But it appears their business relationship is flourishing. I notice their catologue has quite a few.

I've heard their quality isn't good anymore....Well I just received a new Sandown Trilby and it's super light and solid at the sametime...Fur Felt feels wonderful to my finger tips....I have to say, it's very pleasing, and the more I wear it the better I like it...It's a little stiff, but it's a racing felt....It's suppose to be stiff....I'm thinking they deserve their lofty place in Hatter History and live up to their historic reputation...YMMV, ha,ha...

They have just released their "Lock & Roll" series...I hate the name but I must admit...I believe its a very interesting contemporary twist...The "Supreme" model is a high quality modern Homburg, and quite fetching....I didn't expect it...The "Supreme is the second picture down in the Simpson interview....

Nope, I don't think it's time to write Lock & Co. Off.....in fact, just the opposite...I think its time to support them and enjoy their exceptional quality and fine examples of "Functional Art".

Is there a Lock & Co. Brotherhood around here? If not, maybe there should be...

 

[Bird Lives]

Another article on Lock & Co Hatters,again nother earth shattering but there are some interesting tidbits of trivia....
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/10/03/travel/lock-s-of-london-gentlemen-s-hatters.html
Or...heres a copy.....
LOCK'S OF LONDON: GENTLEMAN HATTERS
DOUGLAS SUTHERLAND is the author of some 30 books, including a series on ''The English Gentleman'' and books on espionage. He lives in a castle in Scotland. By DOUGLAS SUTHERLAND

T here is no street in London where the ghosts of the 18th century crowd so thickly as St. James's Street. Adjacent Pall Mall may be described as the heart of clubland with its great places standing cheek by jowl, their marbled halls and vast rooms vying with one another in Victorian ostentation, but turn up St. James's Street toward Piccadilly and the elegance of Regency architecture at once asserts itself. The old coffee and chocolate houses once patronized by men of fashion, now clubs like Boodle's, Brooks's and White's, still present their stylish facades to passersby. It was at White's that Beau Brummel once remarked how he liked to sit in the window with his cronies ''watching the damned people getting wet outside.'' Today they are still the most exclusive of all London's clubs.

It is not surprising that it is in St. James's Street that you will find businesses that have served the ''quality'' for 200 years and still quietly carry on their trade unchanged by time. Berry Brothers and Rudd at No. 3 is London's oldest wine merchant, and nearby stands John Lobb where, in the comfortable atmosphere of a good club, one can be fitted for the world's finest footwear at around $340.

Older than either, at 6 St. James's Street, is Lock and Company, the hatters who trace their origins back to 1676 when Robert Davis started the business and whose descendant a generaton later was to be joined both in business and matrimony by a member of the property-owning Lock family. The descendants of this union still control the business.

In an earlier age everyone wore a hat. To be seen outdoors - and on occasion indoors - without one was as unthinkable as taking a stroll along Piccadilly without trousers. By and large anyone who was anyone beat a path to the door of Mr. Lock.

One of Nelson's last acts before setting sail to rejoin the fleet and engage the French and Spanish at Trafalgar was to pick up the cocked hat that he had ordered to be fitted with a special shade to cover his blind eye. He was wearing it when he was killed. (It can be seen on his effigy in Westminster Abbey.)

Ten years later the ''cock't fore and aft,'' which Wellington wore at Waterloo, was made by Lock as were the hats of most of his officers. One of his aides, General Picton, found that his regimental hat gave him a headache so he chose to lead a cavalry charge wearing one of Mr. Lock's toppers.

Some officers not only ordered their own regimental hats from Lock but the headgear for all their troops as well. In the records is an order from General Grosvenor not only for ''7 gents regimental hats with accessories'' at a cost of 63, but also special hats for all other ranks from staff sergeants down to ''765 privates caps complete with plumes.''

If Nelson or Wellington were to walk into Locks today, they would find little changed. The shop still has its original Regency paneling, and the coffined staircase still gives access to the upper floors. (Coffined staircases were designed so that a coffin could be lowered down the well of the staircase where the sharp angle of the stairs themselves made the operation impossible.) Customers have access to the second floor, where there is a selection of tweed hats. Above that floor are company offices.

Lock's has always maintained a tradition of catering to the special needs of its customers rather than making an attempt to dictate fashion. Thus it was that when in 1850 one of the Cokes of the Earl of Leicester's family came into Lock's for a low-crowned hard hat for hunting, one less likely to be knocked off by low branches than the traditiional high-crowned beaver hat, Mr. Lock 3d readily obliged. (With typical British eccentricity the Earls of Leicester do not come from Leicester but from Norfolk, and the family name of Coke is pronounced Cook.)

Because Lock's is not a manufacturer the company contracted the task out to the firm of Thomas and William Bowler, whereupon the bowler hat, later to be adopted as part of the uniform of the City, was born. Lock's still refers to its hard hats as Coke hats and likes it when customers get the pronounciation right. The Bowler firm later started selling the Coke invention under its own name.

Although the Coke or bowler is in decline, the range of Lock hats has a remarkably cosmopolitan look. There are tweed hats and caps, deerstalkers, polo caps, Panama hats, homburgs, Tyrol hats and Chelsea hats (presumably for hunting nearer home).

Perhaps the most significant change in the long history of the firm is the steady development of its trade with America, which started in 1781 when James Lock provided a ''fine beaver hat'' for a Mr. Mallet of New York. Over the last century trade with America has increased dramatically; today America is the largest export outlet, and one out of every four customers who walk into Lock's in London are from America.

Over the years many of America's richest and most distinguished people have called regularly to have their hats fitted: the Rockefellers, the Mellons, Frank Sinatra, Gregory Peck and Douglas Fairbanks Jr., who once had a flat above the premises.

Lock's present managing director, Richard Bruce Geden Stephenson, has a particular affection for America, which he visits every year, having forged strong links with stores like Brooks Brothers. Locks also supplies velvet hunting caps and polo hats to specialty stores, mostly on the West Coast.

There is little variation in the price of a Lock hat in the United States or Britain. A polo cap or hunting hard hat is about $145; golfing or shooting tweed caps are about $25, and a lightweight Coke hat is about $75.Ready-made felts range from about $45 to $75, and one can be custom made for about $9 more.

For those who want a custom-made tweed hat, Lock's does not supply the fabric but will fashion a hat from a customer's material for about $36.

Lock's is open from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Monday to Friday and from 9.30 A.M. to 12.30 P.M. on Saturday.

 

[RJR]

Another article on Lock & Co Hatters,again nother earth shattering but there are some interesting tidbits of trivia....
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/10/03/travel/lock-s-of-london-gentlemen-s-hatters.html
Or...heres a copy.....
LOCK'S OF LONDON: GENTLEMAN HATTERS
DOUGLAS SUTHERLAND is the author of some 30 books, including a series on ''The English Gentleman'' and books on espionage. He lives in a castle in Scotland. By DOUGLAS SUTHERLAND

T here is no street in London where the ghosts of the 18th century crowd so thickly as St. James's Street. Adjacent Pall Mall may be described as the heart of clubland with its great places standing cheek by jowl, their marbled halls and vast rooms vying with one another in Victorian ostentation, but turn up St. James's Street toward Piccadilly and the elegance of Regency architecture at once asserts itself. The old coffee and chocolate houses once patronized by men of fashion, now clubs like Boodle's, Brooks's and White's, still present their stylish facades to passersby. It was at White's that Beau Brummel once remarked how he liked to sit in the window with his cronies ''watching the damned people getting wet outside.'' Today they are still the most exclusive of all London's clubs.

It is not surprising that it is in St. James's Street that you will find businesses that have served the ''quality'' for 200 years and still quietly carry on their trade unchanged by time. Berry Brothers and Rudd at No. 3 is London's oldest wine merchant, and nearby stands John Lobb where, in the comfortable atmosphere of a good club, one can be fitted for the world's finest footwear at around $340.

Older than either, at 6 St. James's Street, is Lock and Company, the hatters who trace their origins back to 1676 when Robert Davis started the business and whose descendant a generaton later was to be joined both in business and matrimony by a member of the property-owning Lock family. The descendants of this union still control the business.

In an earlier age everyone wore a hat. To be seen outdoors - and on occasion indoors - without one was as unthinkable as taking a stroll along Piccadilly without trousers. By and large anyone who was anyone beat a path to the door of Mr. Lock.

One of Nelson's last acts before setting sail to rejoin the fleet and engage the French and Spanish at Trafalgar was to pick up the cocked hat that he had ordered to be fitted with a special shade to cover his blind eye. He was wearing it when he was killed. (It can be seen on his effigy in Westminster Abbey.)

Ten years later the ''cock't fore and aft,'' which Wellington wore at Waterloo, was made by Lock as were the hats of most of his officers. One of his aides, General Picton, found that his regimental hat gave him a headache so he chose to lead a cavalry charge wearing one of Mr. Lock's toppers.

Some officers not only ordered their own regimental hats from Lock but the headgear for all their troops as well. In the records is an order from General Grosvenor not only for ''7 gents regimental hats with accessories'' at a cost of 63, but also special hats for all other ranks from staff sergeants down to ''765 privates caps complete with plumes.''

If Nelson or Wellington were to walk into Locks today, they would find little changed. The shop still has its original Regency paneling, and the coffined staircase still gives access to the upper floors. (Coffined staircases were designed so that a coffin could be lowered down the well of the staircase where the sharp angle of the stairs themselves made the operation impossible.) Customers have access to the second floor, where there is a selection of tweed hats. Above that floor are company offices.

Lock's has always maintained a tradition of catering to the special needs of its customers rather than making an attempt to dictate fashion. Thus it was that when in 1850 one of the Cokes of the Earl of Leicester's family came into Lock's for a low-crowned hard hat for hunting, one less likely to be knocked off by low branches than the traditiional high-crowned beaver hat, Mr. Lock 3d readily obliged. (With typical British eccentricity the Earls of Leicester do not come from Leicester but from Norfolk, and the family name of Coke is pronounced Cook.)

Because Lock's is not a manufacturer the company contracted the task out to the firm of Thomas and William Bowler, whereupon the bowler hat, later to be adopted as part of the uniform of the City, was born. Lock's still refers to its hard hats as Coke hats and likes it when customers get the pronounciation right. The Bowler firm later started selling the Coke invention under its own name.

Although the Coke or bowler is in decline, the range of Lock hats has a remarkably cosmopolitan look. There are tweed hats and caps, deerstalkers, polo caps, Panama hats, homburgs, Tyrol hats and Chelsea hats (presumably for hunting nearer home).

Perhaps the most significant change in the long history of the firm is the steady development of its trade with America, which started in 1781 when James Lock provided a ''fine beaver hat'' for a Mr. Mallet of New York. Over the last century trade with America has increased dramatically; today America is the largest export outlet, and one out of every four customers who walk into Lock's in London are from America.

Over the years many of America's richest and most distinguished people have called regularly to have their hats fitted: the Rockefellers, the Mellons, Frank Sinatra, Gregory Peck and Douglas Fairbanks Jr., who once had a flat above the premises.

Lock's present managing director, Richard Bruce Geden Stephenson, has a particular affection for America, which he visits every year, having forged strong links with stores like Brooks Brothers. Locks also supplies velvet hunting caps and polo hats to specialty stores, mostly on the West Coast.

There is little variation in the price of a Lock hat in the United States or Britain. A polo cap or hunting hard hat is about $145; golfing or shooting tweed caps are about $25, and a lightweight Coke hat is about $75.Ready-made felts range from about $45 to $75, and one can be custom made for about $9 more.

For those who want a custom-made tweed hat, Lock's does not supply the fabric but will fashion a hat from a customer's material for about $36.

Lock's is open from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Monday to Friday and from 9.30 A.M. to 12.30 P.M. on Saturday.

Interesting,thanks for posting.

 

[Bird Lives]

I found it interesting.....for one, I didn't know what a coffined staircase meant...

And I did hear that General Picton died at the Battle of Waterloo leading a most effective bayonnet charge, that probably secured the win for General Wellington. General Picton's last words were "Charge! Charge! Hurrah! Hurrah!" when he received a musket ball to the temple. He was leading the attack wearing civilian clothes and a top hat, apparently purchased at Lock & Co.

And I love the bit about General Grosvenor buying hats from Lock & Co. for every solder in his outfit. He was a Billionare, but still thats so cool that he shared such generousity with his troops.