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The Cap Faction

Jomodad

New in Town
Messages
17
Location
Anaheim, California
amu4aje4.jpg


I have made some caps too. But the quality of the one pictured above way surpasses my skills. This is a cap I made for a girlfriend of mine.


Are we having fun yet?
 

Stuffsmith

Fedora Lounge Artisan
Messages
808
Location
Sydney
Okay, so I'm traveling here in Brisbane, Australia. I've got 2 free days, so I journey around the city of about 2+ million, looking in antique malls and op shops with the vague hope of finding a vintage cap. I've never looked outside the internet for vintage caps, and I got a lesson in the scarcity of them, at least in this area: in two days of looking, I found not one - ugly, beautiful or anything in between.

Yesterday I was in the small city of Ipswich and ventured into one antique store, and asked the owner wearily if he had any caps, to which he replied, "Yep." My pulse quickened and he led me to a dusty, promising little stack of berets & odd pieces. At the bottom, I found this grey cap and since it fit, thought I'd take it home, having some doubts as to its quality.
A gentle wool wash released so much dirt that I was blown away.


So I'll put it to you pros: have I got a cheapo 1970's polyester dud, or is there something I'm missing? You can see the 'wool' is backed by knitted fabric, and what appears to be jute with it. The shape is nice, it has a decent profile, so I'm not unhappy with it, but I'd like to know about what to look for. The monofilament line used made me doubly suspect that it isn't very old. I need to be able to check this stuff out on site! Thanks in advance for your knowing eyes, guys.

Keith

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
 

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Stuffsmith

Fedora Lounge Artisan
Messages
808
Location
Sydney
Thanks Ed. I thought so - as a designer, the typography is always my first indicator of age - that tag checks out for 1960s or newer.
 
Messages
13,678
Location
down south
Studfsmith you have inspired me

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Messages
12,032
Location
East of Los Angeles
...So I'll put it to you pros: have I got a cheapo 1970's polyester dud, or is there something I'm missing? You can see the 'wool' is backed by knitted fabric, and what appears to be jute with it. The shape is nice, it has a decent profile, so I'm not unhappy with it, but I'd like to know about what to look for. The monofilament line used made me doubly suspect that it isn't very old...
I'm far from being a "pro", but the shape of the cap and the texture of the material (seen in the fourth photo you posted) look a lot like a cap I bought new in the mid- to late-70s. I have no idea what material my cap was made from, but even after wearing it several times it remained rather stiff and not particularly comfortable so I stopped wearing it.

Studfsmith you have inspired me...
That looks like a great cap dh, and it suits you very well!
 
Keith,

It's probably made by Pendleton (from what I can see of the liner), and the writing in the liner crown has probably rubbed away (they all do). the hat is undoubtedly from the late 60s-middle 70s, when Pendleton and some other makers were producing some caps that were very close to the 30s/40s patterns.

At the bottom, I found this grey cap and since it fit, thought I'd take it home, having some doubts as to its quality.
A gentle wool wash released so much dirt that I was blown away.


So I'll put it to you pros: have I got a cheapo 1970's polyester dud, or is there something I'm missing? You can see the 'wool' is backed by knitted fabric, and what appears to be jute with it. The shape is nice, it has a decent profile, so I'm not unhappy with it, but I'd like to know about what to look for. The monofilament line used made me doubly suspect that it isn't very old. I need to be able to check this stuff out on site! Thanks in advance for your knowing eyes, guys.

Keith

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
 

Stuffsmith

Fedora Lounge Artisan
Messages
808
Location
Sydney
Dh66 - badass cap, pal! You've got a serious hoodlum curve to that visor!

Baron - Thank you for that info, Pete – that rounds out and confirms my intuition about the cap.

In the converted warehouse studio building that I've been teaching in this last week, there's a Turkish tailor who has gotten very excited about the idea of making a pattern from this cap and enlarging the diameter a little bit. So this gray Pendleton may be more fruitful than I realized!
 
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esteban68

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,107
Location
Chesterfield, Derbyshire, England
It was a tad large so I hot hand-washed it to A remove a slight staining to front of sweatband and B to see if I could shrink it...success on both counts as it's now really clean and though not completely dry yet it has in fact shrunk ton an almost perfect fit.....winner!
 
Messages
12,032
Location
East of Los Angeles
I prefer being behind the camera rather than in front of it, but since I've broken the ice by posting photos of myself wearing my newest hat in the Akubra Campdraft thread I thought I'd finally contribute more to this thread than compliments and wisecracks, so here we go.

This is the first flat cap I'd purchased in decades, a no-name "Made in U.S.A." 8/4 panel cap with a tweed pattern:

US_Tweed_1_zpsdb01a95e.jpg

US_Tweed_2_zps9f2a3c52.jpg


Since I had purchased this cap primarily to wear with my Wested "Raiders" jacket, I really was looking for something in a darker brown; at the time this was the closest I could find. Regardless, I like the shape, the color, and the pattern. It's a great hat that I paid only $25 for, so it was a real bargain.

Edit: Wow, those photos are huge! Well, I suppose they allow everyone to get a good look at the patterns and colors.
 
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Messages
12,032
Location
East of Los Angeles
My next cap is a Hat People full cut 8/4 panel (as are all of my Hat People caps):

HP_WGB_HB_1_zpsfb3630c9.jpg

HP_WGB_HB_2_zps885a7143.jpg


As best I can remember, the pattern was described as "white, gray, and black Herringbone". Because I was really looking for a darker gray Herringbone I was hoping it would be darker than it appeared in the sample photos on the Hat People website; it wasn't. I know there are quite a few members here who don't particularly care for Hat People's caps because of their "lack of shape" and/or other reasons, but I really like them.
 
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