Newbie questions

[peleus]

Hi everyone

After having searched through the internet for information about fedoras, I am very happy to have found this forum. There are some real experts as I have seen. In the last few weeks, I have read a lot of threads and learnt much about fedoras. Still, there are some questions remaining I hope you can answer.

I am 26 years old, living in Switzerland, and I am interested in purchasing a custom-made fedora. Please give me some advice. Following are the criteria I have thought of a hat. I intend to wear the hat most of the time in dark (black or gray) business suits or in casual wear (as shown in the photos below). The hat will not excessivley be exposed to rain or snow but it should not just melt away when getting wet.

Is there any difference in style between traditional European and American dress fedoras? I have heard that American fedoras are a bit stiffer and have higher crowns with a larger ribbon compared to their European counterparts. Is that generally true? Personally, I think that I would prefer a rather less stiff fedora with a not too stingy brim. But I am not yet sure what crown height and crown shape would be best for me.

Also, I am still not sure which material would be best for the fedora. Although it has often been stated in this forum that beaver felt has the best quality in terms of water resistance, this feature is not that relevant for me. I am more interested in the looks and feel of the material. Can anybody tell me how rabbit, nutria, and beaver felts are different with respect to these aspects? In a hat-shop, I was told that in beaver felt one can see somehow the structure of fine hair (which I wouldn't like) while rabbit felt looks more like a plain piece of material (or at least has shorter hair). According to the seller, Europeans don't like the look of beaver felt because it would have a rather feminine touch. Is that true? Or is it possible to process beaver or nutria felt to look the same as rabbit felt? What about the blends?

As much as I have seen in the Internet, I like the Borsalino Beaver fedora (400 $) which is too expensive for my budget. Many participants of the forum have said that a better custom-made hat can be obtained for less money (e.g. from Art Fawcett or Fedora). I am still not sure what color would be best for rather dark suits. Is a gray fedora the most appropriate? What other colors could be considered as well?

I am a little confused what a snap-brim fedora exactly is. Am I right with the assumption that the front brim can just be snapped down while the rear brim shows up? Can Safari-styled fedoras also be changed to look like a dress fedora on a daily basis or does it need a complete reshaping? Are there fedoras with a front brim that cannot be snapped down?

I have thought about ordering a hat from Art. Does anybody know about his pricing and his delivery time? Perhaps, Art can answer me himself. I have attached some pictures of me and would be glad if the one or other could suggest me what kind of fedora shape (brim size, crown height, color, ribbon, crown shape) would suit me best. My hat size is 58 (I guess that would be 7 1/4, right?) and I am 182 cm (5 feet 9") tall. Of course, I would also appreciate if you could show me pictures of some classical dress fedoras which you think would suit me. Just to get an idea.

Thank you very much for your help.

Patrick

I am the one on the right side:

 

[peleus]

Come on guys. Help out this newbie with some information

 

[jamespowers]

Boy there are a lot of questions to answer here.
If you are going to wear a lot of black and gray suits then you will need a black and/or gray hat.
Modern American hats from the big manufacturers are a bit stiff compared to a european Borsalino and such. This is not true of the custom made hats though. They can be as stiff as you like or as soft and pliable as you like. It just depends on the weight of the felt used and the stiffner added. A cowboy hat will definitely be stiffer though.
I am not sure who you have been talking to about beaver fur felt but they are wrong. A beaver fur felt has superior qualities to rabbit fur and can be finished much finer than rabbit fur. Maybe they just have never seen a nice beaver fur felt finished with great skill or they are just trying to sell you an inferior hat.
Beaver fur has superior qualities over a rabbit or hare fur felt because it is a wild animal whose fur is exposed to the cold. The fur is thick and lustrous. It is water proof on the animal and is the same when made into a fur felt hat correctly. Beaver fur is graded for use in the felting industry. They do not use the back hair because it gets tough (guard hairs) from being rubbed against the beaver's den home that is above the water line. The beaver fur from the sides of the beaver is good fur felt but the belly fur or silver belly is the best hair of the beaver pelt. The Nutria is really just a south american beaver without the shovel tail. They do not live in the same kind of dens as the Beaver so their back hair is ok to use but their belly fur is the best as well.
Wild hare is another source for fur felt hats but it is not really being used much today in the production of fur felt hats. Domestic rabbit is used. This is unfotunate because the domestic rabbit is not only being raised for its pelt but for its meat. So breeders feed these animals high fat foods that fatten them up and really grease up the fur. Rabbit fur must be dry cleaned before it can be used in the felting process. To give you an example of how much fat is removed, the old Mallory hat company had soap companies lining up to get the barrels of fat and grease removed by the dry cleaning of the fur.
Now that you have a background on the fur we are talking about, we can talk about the hats. There are those hatters you mentioned that produce a great hat for less than the Borsalino. You should contact them and see what they can do for you in a beaver felt. I guarantee you will be pleased with the feel and fit. Before you order though, try on a few hats locally and see what the prevailing size is for your hats. You need to be sure of the size. A 7 1/4 can be a regualr oval, long oval or extra long oval and it makes a difference in the sizing. I am not sure if they have that kind of sizing where you are but get as close to perfect for you as you can. A 58 cm hat in your area is indeed a 7 1/4 in America.
You are completely right about a snap brim fedora. The front can be snapped down from your temples forward to produce a downward slant to the front of the brim while the back of the hat has the brim still up. You can actually wear the brim up all around, down in front up--in back or down all the way around. A snap brim hat is very versatile in that sense. Stetson used to call that their three way hat.
Art will have to answer you himself as to pricing but I can say that I have had several hats made and repaired by him and I am more than satisfied. This includes beaver hats with a very fine finish.
Lastly, I looked at your pictures and I think you could well pull off wearing a wider 2 1/2 inch brim fedora. It is not so much your height but your shoulder width and shape of your face. That should work fine for you. My grandfather was about 5'6" tall and he wore a 2 1/2 inch brim fedora just fine because his shoulders were broad and it fit his face. Again, try on a few where you are and see what you think looks best.
I hope my long, long ramblings helped some.

Regards to all,

J

 

[Andykev]

Welcome to the Lounge

I have enjoyed seeing your pictures. I was in an Ice tunnel when I visited Switzerland, Austria, and Germany back in...87? you were what? 10? Gads, I am getting old!. Beautiful part of the world. I went over to the Oktoberfest, fur einen grosse bier :beer:

My spelling is terrible. I began to learn German, but then, if not used, you loose it. Funny, I clicked your links and read most of it in Deutch, then clicked English, and is was almost the same. I only missed a bit of it.

As for hats..I have about 50 left in my collection. I have Optimo, Art Fawcett, Vintage (Dobbs, Stetson, Mac Lachlan, Cavanagh, Rogers Peet, etc.). I highly recommend Ebay for great finds, and 7 1/4 is not too unusual to find a nice size.
As a matter of fact, I have some I am considering "disposing of" in that very size. Not sure yet, no promises.

I recommend you contact Art and arrange for a custom hat. He can do it for a very reasonable price. You want to get it right, as the shipping back and forth for "adjustments" can be prohibitive.

Vintage, IMHO, has somewhat dried up on Ebay, as I suspected it would. Yous also risk obtaining something with moth holes, tracking, or bad odors, ..even wrong size.

Anyway, we'll chat later. Enjoy!

 

[Slicksuit]

JP - thanks for the information, very interesting.

Peleus - Switzerland? Very neat. Do you find that fedoras are becoming more popular there now than before? I wonder what the trend in popularity is for the hat over there. Also, just out of curiosity, what kind of work do you do (assuming you're wearing the suits to work)?

 

[Matt Deckard]

Is there any difference in style between traditional European and American dress fedoras? I have heard that American fedoras are a bit stiffer and have higher crowns with a larger ribbon compared to their European counterparts. Is that generally true? Personally, I think that I would prefer a rather less stiff fedora with a not too stingy brim. But I am not yet sure what crown height and crown shape would be best for me.

European hats were pretty similar to US hats from what I can see in the movies of the 30's and 40's. I do think that the europeans had more of a rakish worn out look to their hats, that could be because of the weather or just that their hats were more inclined to have rabbit in the mix while US hats had more beaver. The hats from the golden era european and US, from what I can tell, if they were dress fedoras were primarily soft hats.

Though... I think lower crowns were a bit more prevelant in europe.

 

[peleus]

Thanks to all of you for your replies! I appreciate it very much. As I said, there are some true experts in this forum. Some years ago, when there was no internet available, it would not have been possible to exchange knowledge that easily.

Let's see what I can comment on the individual replies.

BB: I have seen the fedoras at Millerhats.com. There are some very nice pieces. I agree with you that a gray, black and brown fedora will be a nice collection. For now, I just thought of starting with a gray hat that could be worn with almost any clothing.

JP: That was a comprehensive reply to my questions. Thanks! I got the information about the beaver felt from a small hat shop. Well, as I had read some threads about beaver felt in this forum before I went there, I suspected that he just wanted to sell me one of his hats. He had no beaver felt fedoras in his shop. But on the other side, he has been quite nice. I guess that traditional hat shops in Europe have not that much customers any more and I ask myself where they get enough money from to survive. A lot of information you give about beavers. I guess you gained this knowledge over the past few years. Thanks again for your individual advice on the brim size.

Andykev: Well, I didn't show you the Ice tunnel to show off . It's just that I had no other pictures that would have been more appropriate. I guess, I never take photos of myself when I am at home. 87, that's quite a time ago. Have you been to Europe ever since? Well, German is quite a difficult language, particularly due to all the changing endings of the adjectives and verbs. And in German you can do quite complicated phrases where you finally don't see any more how you started the sentence. Mark Twain who spoke a lot of languages once said that a talented person could learn German in 20 years ;-). As you might know however, in Switzerland we do speak at school and we read and write High German, but in daily life, we use Swiss German, which the Germans do not understand. It's funny, as a lot of people don't know this, that Swiss German is just a type of German that has stopped in its development since the middle ages. Ok, let's go back to fedoras! I have read that today's hats are not comparable to vintage fedoras. Perhaps Optimo would come nearest to them in terms of quality. Well, for my purposes I think that a fine modern fedora is fairly enough good. As you said, I want to avoid shipping the hat from the U.S. back and forth to Switzerland. Perhaps, I first visit some hat shops. However, the 58 from Borsalino fits quite well. But I am not sure if it not also depends on the individual manufacturer. If you are anyway going to dispose of some of your hats, just let me know. But in the moment I am just fine with a custom made hat.

Slicksuit: No, unfortunately, I guess fedoras are not becoming more popular in Switzerland, at least not with the people of my age. Of course, there are a lot of older people who did not stop wearing hats. My grandfather was one of those who would not have left his house without his hat. For me, it's just that I like fedoras very much. Perhaps it started when I watched Dick Tracy. When I was in Rome with my parents (I was perhaps 15), we bought a cream-colored hat. However, I only wore it few times. It was a bit too tight and my school comrades would have laughed at me when wearing a hat. I still have the hat but recognize today that it is quite a cheap one. Today I am more self-confident and would no more care what the others would think, I just like fedoras. I am not planning to wear hats on a daily basis, but rather when I feel to wear one. The disadvantage would be the hat hair, I guess :-(. Concerning your question about my work. I am just finishing my studies in economics and finance. Beginning in April, I am planning to start a Ph.D. while working at the same time for one of the big Swiss Banks. I know the stereotypes you all have about Switzerland: Chocolate, skiing, banks, cheese, tunnels and a heavily oversized army ;-).

MD: Thanks for your information. The guy in the hat shop said the same, European hats had a lower crown size.

If some of you still have some information or advice, just don't hesitate, go on. I appreciate any comment.

P

 

[Art Fawcett]

Peleus
Please forgive me tardiness in responding to this thread. I am traveling on business with little time for the Lounge. I would be pleased to correspond via email when I return to home base on Monday night.
JP has given you terrific information that I can find no flaws in so I will leave that stand without comment. It seems that what we have to talk about is left to colors, style, & pricing. All of which are easy. :cheers1:

Take care

Art

 

[peleus]

Hi Art, thanks. Just write me an email when you are back from your trip. Wish you to have a nice Sunday.