Determining Felt quality?

[Levallois]

Can anyone please give me a guide to how one judges the grade or quality of the felt used to make a hat. It is density, softness, bendability (if that is even a word), etc.? I put this over on the SBS too. Thank you.

John

 

[Matt Deckard]

One of the first threads I started on the old Fedora Lounge was on The quality of felt. It laid out the different mixes and what their general qualities were, how cowboy hats are hard to compare to dress hats, how beaver is not the beat all end all in materials, and how modern hatters have yet to make a felt that keeps shrinking at bay like those made in the past.

I've been busy for quite a while with personal matters, though I'd like to get this conversation started again if it can remain civil. The hatting industry is place where quality takes a back seat to spinning when it comes to many companies. The "x" factor in hats is rubbish and was rubbish when they were using it in the 1800's, no two hatters had the same standard and the standard changed within the company yearly.

The things I look for in a good fedora are its ability to hold up against rain without drooping; Its ability to resist tapering (shrinking of the crown after little wear), its ability to hold its color (nobody wants a grey hat that turns pink) and for a fedora, the ability to be crushed and rolled and return to its original shape without being visibibly affected.

Felt quality depends on the materials you use and with fur you have many animals and breeds to choose from. Beaver is preffered though not always the best depending on what you want from your hat. Hare and Nutria are also felted for hats and different combinations of the three create different qualities of felt with different properties.

The fur like a coffee bean has to be good to begin with in order to have a quality hat. The wrong beavers and you get a bad hat.

More on this later.

 

[hatflick1]

FELT QUALITY

Matt,
A great post. Very hands-on, useful and informative. Especially at a time when many 'brand' hats are licensed to be made by hatters who may or may not observe the original vintage quality.

 

[Marc]

The ability to tell the difference on felts comes with practice (as with most other things). In the beginning you can get a cheap wool felt hat from e-bay and compare it to are nice fur felt hat. You'll be able to see differences in the surface, the feel will be different and the weight. Push a needle through both felts (preferable same thickness). You'll feel that the fur felt is denser...

As Joseph pointed out already, the x-rating system isn't really worth ANYTHING. You can only use it to rate two different hats from the same company made in the same year. But that's about it.

I would however point out that there are good and bad felts today, as there has also been in the past. So in my personal opinion not all modern felt is bad, as well as not all vintage felt is good.

The ability to stand up against rain, can come from either the density of the felt and / or water repellent which really can't be seen on the surface (or stiffner - but that's not for dress hats, at least not in these amounts). Since you can't be sure, whether your hatter used water repellent or not, the ability to stand up against rain doesn't tell you too much about the felt itself (again - just my opinion).

Whether a beaver is always better or not... I reckon there is no final answer to that as all furs have different abilities and it should be up to the customer what he prefers. Personally I would chose a (well made - very important!) beaver hat over a blend any time. It can be pounced finer (not ironed out fine but actually pounced out) and the fur is just finer, so it CAN be made to denser felt. But again one should compare apples with apples and oranges with oranges. If I take a cheaply made beaver body and hold it next to a high end blend body, of course the blend body would look better... Anyway, back in the days, a pure beaver hat was considered to be the best of the best and I believe there was a reason to do so.

So what is quality? - Quality is that what the wearer is asking for. It can be many things... For Joseph it is (amongs other things) "the ability to be crushed and rolled and return to its original shape without being visibibly affected", for other it would be important that the hat keeps it shape, no matter how hard the wind is blowing...

Hope it helps.

Regards,

Marc

 

[nicolasb]

I suspect it's only a matter of time before we see hats advertised as being made from the fur of free-range, organically-fed beavers.

 

[Marc]

If the fur is NOT from a "free-range, organically-fed beaver", it's no good. Best fur is from wild anymals and as far as I know it's not even possible to raise beavers in cages, so...

Cheers,

Marc

 

[nicolasb]

Ah, well, so much the better from an advertising point of view. Last week I found some vegetable oil in the supermarket that was labelled "cholesterol free". No kidding.

 

[gdkenoyer]

... and as far as I know it's not even possible to raise beavers in cages, so...

but nutria are commonly raised in cages, at least until they escape. Years back in Oregon many escaped (or were set free when fur prices fell), the ugly little pests (think REALLY BIG rats!) are still a nuisance...

 

[feltfan]

Wild Nutria

Visit the bayou in Louisiana.
Many decades ago, the story goes, nutria were
freed during a hurricane.

Now you can see those godawful, enormous, muddy rats
all over in the bayou. Not that they bothered me as much
as the abundance of cottonmouths and other vipers, but
they sure are ugly till someone comes along to make a hat
out of them.

The only satisfaction a visitor disgusted by nutria can
have is knowing they are a favorite food of the also
abundant alligators.

And if you're curious, they're readily available in the
meat counters down that way. I stuck with TurDuCkin.

 

[Dave Keith]

We have nutria here in Texas, too. They are certainly more attractive when converted into something useful like gumbo or felt for hats!

They do put a whole new spin on the word "ugly"

PS. My son is a hydrologist and they do a lot of damage to earthen dams. He said they are intentionally exterminated for that reason in some areas.

 

[gdkenoyer]

They look better as hats than on the hoof

Visit the bayou in Louisiana.
Many decades ago, the story goes, nutria were
freed during a hurricane.

ya know, that may be the same story they tell in Oregon...

And if you're curious, they're readily available in the
meat counters down that way.

I hope I'm never _that_ curious. I don't even eat sushi.

 

[Matt Deckard]

There are farm raised animals from Porcupines to deer to sheep to beaver. The fur from Beaver caught in the wild, same with hare is reported to be higher quality. Most felters get their fur from farmed animals. Akubra as far as I know was using hare from wild hare, though that was 10 years ago.

 

[K.D. Lightner]

I thought that, late in the last century or early in this one, beavers were trapped and hunted almost to extinction because of the demand for their pelts.

Evidently, they made a comeback. But I just assumed that there must be beaver farms. Just like Buffalo.

What's the story on this?

karol

 

[jamespowers]

The thing that makes wild beaver fur better is cold weather. The fur comes in thicker and more abundantly in the cold. On the opposite end of that is the back hair of wild beaver is unuseable due to it constantly hitting the top of the dam as beavers go into their lairs.
The beaver they get now is for the most part from warmer areas. The fur does not have the same qualties. This is why Matt is correct in saying that not all beaver fur is created equal. Beaver fur from the back of the animal is the coarsest and cheapest grade. You can make a hat out of it but it will not be smooth and take a nice finish in the end. The best fur of the beaver comes from the belly. You see the term silverbelly because the belly fur is a silver/tan sort of color on a beaver and it is easy to distinguish. A hat made from this would be very nice without guard hairs sticking up out of it and all around a perfect hat for any weather. It will hold up to anything you can deal it.
Hatters also have blends that are from several animals like hare, beaver, nutria, rabbit and probably some we don't want to know. Mink also makes a decent felt hat. Better than beaver I am not sure. Soft, supple, dense and nearly shiny----yes. I am waiting for someone to come up with some mink bodies. That would be an interesting felt hat.

regards to all,

J

 

[Matt Deckard]

I have talked to hatters about mink and from what I hear it is a gimmick felt and the bodies they have used are crap. May be the quality of the mink, though you don't find many fond stories about mink felt through hat history. Better for coats where the fur doesn't have to be felted is my take.

 

[jamespowers]

I have talked to hatters about mink and from what I hear it is a gimmick felt and the bodies they have used are crap. May be the quality of the mink, though you don't find many fond stories about mink felt through hat history. Better for coats where the fur doesn't have to be felted is my take.

Check out a Borsalino mink felt from the 1920s, if you can find one, and then compare. Feels great, has a heck of a dense felt and looks nice. I have no idea what they can make today though. Maybe the process was lost back then. :cry:
The most supple felt I have ever gotten my hands on was otter. Otter felt was just intense. The density, the feel, the finish and the weight was just perfect. A few others here were lucky enough to get their hands on it as well. That was a super felt hat. Art can back me up on this.

Regards to all,

J

 

[nicolasb]

Seeing as we're being thoroughly un-politically-correct - I know that the most prized fur for making fur coats is sea otter, because of the density (the number of hairs per square inch). What sort of factors control how suitable a fur is for making felt, and do they make otter hats?

 

[SHARPETOYS]

X factor

Here is a Honest hatter that talks about the X factor.

It's unfortunate, but the X's marked in hats don't really mean much anymore. In a simpler time they did, but the standard became corrupt and now it's pretty much a way to fool the hat buying public.

The quality of materials in a western hat is measured, in part, by how much beaver is in the mix. A custom hat from Greeley Hat Works is 100% pure beaver.

Back in the day when trappers began trading their beaver pelts to the eastern markets, the higher the quality pelts received more X's (and more dollars). This, in turn, was used in grading the quality of hats.

In 1940 a 5X hat was of high quality and cost $50.00, $5.00 per X. A 10X hat was 100% beaver and cost $100.00.

Well, the less scrupulous folks in the hat industry saw an opportunity.

By the late 1960's the X's were going higher and the quality was going lower. Now, you can buy a 100X, 200X, or even a 500X ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú and it may not even be 100% pure beaver.

Beaver is the best quality hair/fur for hats ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú not the cheapest. A beaver hat is thin, lightweight, and weather resistant. Anytime you take beaver out of a hat and put in any other type of hair (even cashmere) you lower the quality.

Today's X's in hats aren't standardized ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äú one company's 20X could be the same as another companies 8X.

Rarely is beaver even used in factory made hats under 20X, 30X or 40X. At some companies the difference between a 20X and 30X hat is the buckle set on the side.



http://www.greeleyhatworks.com/html/index.asp?url=/html/presidential/index.html

Beware of a hat seller on the net that use's 500X 1000X and I have even seen him post MillionX plus he has a fancy name for beaver felt.

 

[Mulberrywood]

Is beaver the best for hot summer days? Or would a wool hat be best for that? (leaving straw and cotton out for the moment)

 

[fedoralover]

Wool is great for socks, suits and shirts but not for fedora's. A thin beaver felt hat in the summer is not that bad. I wear felt hats all summer.

fedoralover