I posted the photo below in the MC Gannon forum but I thought I should make a separate thread on this topic. For many years, I would watch old movies the loved the look of the old vintage hats, but I was always disappointed when I went to hat stores because to my eyes the standard teardrop bash didn't have anywhere near the same character as the hat on the right in the photo. And when I say "old movies" I mean old black and white movies made during the days when everyone wore hats. The hats that appear period movies made today, but set in the 1930's, do not have the same character that I saw in those old movies.
At first I thought getting a hat like the hat on the right was just a function of higher quality and a custom hatter. It is, but the hat on the left is as high quality as the hat on the right. I told two previous hat makers that I wanted a hat like that I'm used to seeing in just about every old movie, and they said "sure, your hat will be 100% beaver, dress weight, just like you want." But then it would always look like the hat on the left, which was not what I wanted. And then I thought, "well maybe if I wear the hat on the left more often it will break-in and eventually look like the hats in the movies. But they never did "break-in", and I spent a lot of money on hats never getting what I wanted.
Hat maker Michael Gannon shares my same stylistic preferences for vintage hats. The hat on the right is a Michael Gannon hat. Michael thins the felt on the crown to help achieve this look, but the hat on the right has not been steamed, whereas the Optimo hat on the left has been steamed, making that teardrop crease permanent. What I didn't know, maybe $2,000 ago, was that I wanted an unsteamed Michael Gannon hat.
At first I thought getting a hat like the hat on the right was just a function of higher quality and a custom hatter. It is, but the hat on the left is as high quality as the hat on the right. I told two previous hat makers that I wanted a hat like that I'm used to seeing in just about every old movie, and they said "sure, your hat will be 100% beaver, dress weight, just like you want." But then it would always look like the hat on the left, which was not what I wanted. And then I thought, "well maybe if I wear the hat on the left more often it will break-in and eventually look like the hats in the movies. But they never did "break-in", and I spent a lot of money on hats never getting what I wanted.
Hat maker Michael Gannon shares my same stylistic preferences for vintage hats. The hat on the right is a Michael Gannon hat. Michael thins the felt on the crown to help achieve this look, but the hat on the right has not been steamed, whereas the Optimo hat on the left has been steamed, making that teardrop crease permanent. What I didn't know, maybe $2,000 ago, was that I wanted an unsteamed Michael Gannon hat.
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