The Conversion Corral

[Landman]

Scott,

Do you just use a needle and thread or do you use a sewing awl? I think I might have had better luck if I had used a sewing awl. I have used those before on leather and I would think with a smaller needle they would work great for a sweatband.

 

[Chepstow]

Bond, very nice work, Scott! He looks like new! Nice to have the right hands for that!

 

[Joshbru3]

Stetson St. Regis REDUX (Part 1)

I originally bought this Stetson St. Regis on Etsy in December of 2011. From the pictures it looked like a nice gray tall crowed homburg that I intended on converting into a fedora. When I actually received the hat, it was NOT a tall crown, and was not gray. The real color was a blue-ish gray and the color had faded pretty bad through the years because the real color was evident under the liner. When I took the hat to open crown, it was a pretty tapered mid 50's 5 1/2 inch tall block. The color saturation was also pretty poor as well. It looked kind of blotchy.

Here's the original pictures from Etsy that made me think it would be an excellent conversion choice.....

Here's another example of how certain camera angles makes short crowns look very tall.

Shortly after I received the hat, I put a thinner ribbon on the hat, chopped the brim to 2 1/8, and flanged the brim. This is how it stayed for about a year. Its hard to tell from the pictures, but the felt is faded, the color is blotchy, and you could still see a faint line from the wider ribbon when the felt hadn't faded. After a year of wear, the original sweatband had dried out more than beef jerky and the liner was pretty stained. I decided it was time for a re-do.

The first thing I did was take the hat apart to the bare body. My goal was to try and make this a lightweight summer felt like my 1930's Playboy Air-Lite. The felt wasn't super thick, but it needed about half the weight taken off. I blocked the body over a 5 7/8 inch tall block and then went to work with 4 grits of sandpaper. I started with 100 grit which I used to literally take half the weight off the body. About half the fur that was used to felt this hat body at Stetson's factory was literally laying on my floor. I needed to sand the body pretty far because the color had faded so bad through the years, and I also tried to sand it far enough so the color didn't seem so blotchy. I then followed with 220 grit, 400 grit, and then finished it off with 600 grit.

After the sanding was done, I reset the brim break and ironed the brim flat. I have quite a few parts such as sweatbands, ribbons, bows, liners, etc from projects that I have done in the past. I also buy hats that have moth eaten bodies and such and use them for parts. I recently received a late 60's Panama that was completely cracked and destroyed, so I used the sweatband, tip sticker, and sweatband seam bow to transplant onto this St. Regis conversion. I also sanded the inside of the hat body so I could use a tip sticker. I wanted to give the hat as many 30's characteristics as possible so I trimmed the seam of the black 60's panama sweat and made a taped/unsewn rear seam. I sewed the sweatband in the hat, glued the tip sticker, and sewn on the rear seam bow. I finally flanged the brim and sewed on a freshly made bow.

I think the hat came out pretty good. The color saturation is still not as good as I would like, but there isn't a ton I can do about it without re-dying the body. I think the color looks pretty good now that I sanded the body so thin and the texture of the felt is as smooth as butter. The hat body is so light and thin that it will take any crease without steam and if you want the crease to stay, steam is absolutely needed. Even then, its easy to pop out the crease. I compared the weight of this hat to the weight of my playboy Air-Lite and I would say they are the same or this St. Regis may even be slightly lighter.

Here's the un-creased pics.........

 

[Joshbru3]

Stetson St. Regis REDUX (Part 2)

Here's the hat after the crease.....

 

[Lotsahats]

Josh, that's amazing work. I admire your vision on this project, and the results speak for themselves: an unwearable hat has been rehabbed into a great lid. Congratulations!

A

 

[Chepstow]

Josh, as always a fantastic work from the Idea to that result! Magical hands..

 

[mikespens]

Nice job Josh, may have to change your handle to hat-EMT.

 

[BR Gordon]

Great work. I would not have thought that it was the same hat, if you hadn't shown the transformation.

 

[Landman]

Josh,

Great job! That looks fabulous.

What kind of tape did you use for the sweatband seam? Is it a pretty sturdy connection?

 

[splintercellsz]

Wow, Josh! Amazing job!

 

[RBH]

Well done Josh. I always like your center dents.

 

[DOGMAN]

Josh,nice work.Love those tall crown hats.

 

[blazerbud]

All zoot suit considerations aside, that style hat works on you. Few people look so good in a wide brim as you in the picture. If I were you, I'd consider keeping it up with more wide brims. At least, that's what I'd do in America. I have to admit I have no idea what the fashion vigilantes veto over there in the U.K.

That's the look

 

[blazerbud]

All zoot suit considerations aside, that style hat works on you. Few people look so good in a wide brim as you in the picture. If I were you, I'd consider keeping it up with more wide brims. At least, that's what I'd do in America. I have to admit I have no idea what the fashion vigilantes veto over there in the U.K.

Hey, Bond! With the ribbon and bow you were kind enough to sell me, I managed to successfully 'urbanise' my vintage Royal Stetson beater! Thanks! :eusa_clap

Here's the 'story of a conversion':

As I bought it:

This what I meant to comment on, I dig the look.

 

[Joshbru3]

Josh, that's amazing work. I admire your vision on this project, and the results speak for themselves: an unwearable hat has been rehabbed into a great lid. Congratulations!

A

Josh, as always a fantastic work from the Idea to that result! Magical hands..

Nice job Josh, may have to change your handle to hat-EMT.

Great work. I would not have thought that it was the same hat, if you hadn't shown the transformation.

Josh,

Great job! That looks fabulous.

What kind of tape did you use for the sweatband seam? Is it a pretty sturdy connection?

Wow, Josh! Amazing job!

Well done Josh. I always like your center dents.

Josh,nice work.Love those tall crown hats.

THANK YOU so much, everyone!!! It means so much to me that you all liked my Stetson conversion. I wanted to make the hat more like my 30's Air Lite and its really a pleasure to wear. I forget most of the time its even on my head.

Mike, I didn't have archival linen tape, so I actually used very strong medical tape. The medical tape is not only very strong, the adhesive is fairly strong as well. I cut it to size, and as with any taped rear seam, the seam bow stitching is an added reinforcement. I also cut the ends of the sweatband so there is no gap between them. These couple things have produced a pretty strong rear seam. It does have a little give though, so if the sweatband needs to stretch a little, I feel its not as restrictive as a fully stitched rear seam.

 

[bond]

Recent conversion of a nice vintage stetson that had a 2 1/4 overwelt brim and a 2" ribbon, in my mind the hat was lacking some aesthetic balance as no matter how I tried to block it it just didn't look right. So long story short I turned it into a strat since it had a generous crown ht and now has a 2 5/8 brim, making the overall affect more balanced I think . The 3/8 ribbon is silver and came off a strat if similar vintage.
Like to know your opinion of ribbon as it is all I have at the moment in thin ribbons , but have other widths to work with. This is my first black hat to experiment with and it's not the easiest to photograph as well.

 

[Aureliano]

I like the original better. Looks that it had the Stetson Wafer Edge, which I happen to really enjoy.

 

[DJH]

I'm with Ale on this one, Bond. I much preferred the proportions of the original hat.

Nice tall crown with the overwelt brim (and the original ribbon) looked great - block it nice and straight with a center crease and it would be a classic style hat. Hard to see how many rows of stitching there were on the brim, the wafer edge had several I think.

What colour is the felt?

Edit >> Duh - should have read the post correctly, I see it is black. Yep, hard to photograph, especially in any auto exposure mode.

 

[Mulceber]

I'm with Aureliano and DJH - it was much better before. Classically styled hat.

 

[Aureliano]

From an ad I own. And a close-up of my own Stetson. Looks like it matches bond's.