Cavanagh quality

[londonboy]

I am extremely satisfied with the Lock & Co bowler I purchased, but find their fedoras wanting. Taking advice found here, I scanned listings on eBay. My problem is that there is no way to feel a vintage hat on eBay, so one is left to make purchases based on brand. The only ones I have seen that approach the bowler in quality are rabbit fur Borsalinos.

Cavanagh, to pick one from the list of classic makers from another thread, is listed as one of the best in terms of quality from the 20's to the 60's. It also went out of business until recently, so any Cavanagh listed on eBay is likely vintage.

Is it safe to assume that a Cavanagh picked out from eBay would have felt that feels good, and one can bid with confidence if one is satisfied with the styling and condition? Are there other brands one can look for as well, such as Royal Stetson, Knox and Dobbs?

I am unsure what good felt on a fedora feels like, and perhaps I am spoiled. Should one expect a slightly furry, slightly spongy texture, or do the finest vintage hats remind one of high quality suede leather?

 

[feltfan]

Unfortunately, if you must buy on eBay, you
must take some risks. Like anything you learn,
think of the mistakes as the cost of an education
(and don't risk too much at first).

A lot of Cavanaghs were great. Some are not.
Obviously Cavanagh made some tweed hats
and exhibited some other bows to unfortunate
fashion. Some Cavanaghs are a lot stiffer than others.
There was a range of quality in their product line.
Most importantly, some hats carrying the product
name were not up to the overall quality of the Cavanagh
hat. For example, some Cavanaghs have "Worth and Worth"
stamped on their black leather sweatbands. Not as good
as a real Cavanagh-assembled hat with their quality sweats.

As is the case with a lot of vintage hats, the older you go back,
the better they get. But through the 50s and even some of
the 60s hats are really great. For the most part, what I do
is to avoid any Cavanagh with a black sweatband or
that does not have a Cavanagh Edge. I have some notable
exceptions (such as my 60s Cavanagh cowboy hat, which I should
post one of these days, which has a raw edge but is a fine hat),
but for the most part the Cav Edge indicated that the hat was
from the quality end of the product line. If you scroll down to
the end of the following post, you will see a very nice Cavanagh
with a raw edge:
http://www.thefedoralounge.com/showpost.php?p=39603&postcount=1

For more than you ever wanted to know about the
Cavanagh Edge, look here:
http://www.thefedoralounge.com/showthread.php?t=11682

Finally, regarding vintage felt... different manufacturers created
very different feeling felts. As a rule, a good vintage felt has a
slick, almost oily feel to it. It's a feel you'll have to experience a
few times and then it's hard to get it wrong. Many old Borsalino
felts seem dry compared to American felts. Not sure why.
Cavanagh felt tended to be a bit thicker or more dense than
the felt used in some other hats. But again, there were exceptions.
And bigger companies like Mallory and Stetson had specialized
lines of felts that could vary quite a bit, such as Pliafelt (which
is very thin and dense) or Vitafelt (lighter) or Zephyr weight
(very light). This is to say nothing of the huge range of felt
finishes that can completely alter the way the felt feels, like
hairy finishes (pelouche) or velvety (velour or suede), kitten,
and so on.

 

[londonboy]

Extremely interesting, thank you. To clarify, did having the black leather sweatband or lacking the edge mean an inferior felt quality, or was this just a matter of construction? Can one take the hat and have a new sweatband installed?

 

[feltfan]

Extremely interesting, thank you. To clarify, did having the black leather sweatband or lacking the edge mean an inferior felt quality, or was this just a matter of construction? Can one take the hat and have a new sweatband installed?

I haven't seen enough Worth Cavanaghs to know.
The sweatband certainly looks inferior on all that I've
seen and the felt, too. So as far as I know, both.
Someone else here might know- I am guessing they
either bought the name or bought some of the stock of
parts from the NYC store when it closed.

Yeah, you can have a new sweatband put in.
Good luck finding one quite as nice as the old
Cavanagh sweatbands. But the raw edge Cavanagh
in the link I posted above has a new sweatband courtesy
Art Fawcett because the old one had gone stiff. It was
a nice sweatband- hand tooled, wide, and originally
quite soft, but now I can wear the hat... Question
is, what will it cost you? I don't know if Bates or Lock
will do repairs. If you have to send it overseas...

Stick to the old Cavanaghs. And don't forget the
Knoxes or the Dobbses or the better Stetsons or
the Borsalinos from before 1980 or the ... well you
get the picture.

If you're concerned about the risk and the hassle,
I suggest taking a shortcut and ordering a custom
hat from one of the hatters frequently discussed here.
It's not vintage felt, but it still might be better than
a lot of the hats you'll end up with on eBay.

 

[londonboy]

Is it a general sign of inferior quality when the sweatband is black instead of brown?

 

[Brad Bowers]

Is it a general sign of inferior quality when the sweatband is black instead of brown?

It can be. For some unknown reason (but most likely as a sign of progress to consumers), most hat manufacturers had switched to black sweatbands by the late '60s. That doesn't mean that those hats are immediately inferior, but it does give a clue to the age of the hat. If you want to be pretty sure of getting an older hat, look for brown sweatbands.

Brad