Why do you wear a fedora or cap?

[Bill Hughes]

I started loosing my hair years ago. One Christmas, many years ago, when my wife was helping our small children decide what to ge daddy, my son suggested a hat. I liked it and that was that.

 

[Redfokker]

When I graduated with a degree in History from Oregon State University in 2012, my wife thought I should decide on a "signature historian's hat". She bought me a Scala Woolie from our Haberdasher friend thinking it would be my only fedora. I found this place (a fortuitous surfing accident one night) and the rest is history. Why do I wear hats...their history.

 

[GHT]

Worn well a hat can give gravitas and opprobrium. There's nothing like looking through the gap between the top of the specs and the brim of the hat to bring a miscreant to heel: "My office in ten minutes."
Times I've heard someone say, using the F profanity: "I ******* hate it when he stares at me in that ******* hat!"

 

[Zombie_61]

...I've decided that I'm old enough now not to care what others think of me or my fashion sense...

That's how it started for me as well. I always liked fedoras, but in my younger days felt they would look like a costume item on me; in Lounge parlance, that the hat would be wearing me. When I was in my mid-40s I decided I had waited long enough, was then old enough, and sincerely didn't care about what anyone else thought, so I got my first "proper" hat. That was nearly 10 years ago, and now I feel strange on those rare occasions when I leave the house without a hat.

...I've had 15 MOHS surgeries for Basal cell & squamous cell carcinoma...

I've had only the one so far (Basal Cell Carcinoma), and because it was so small and it was caught so early I'm convinced they removed the cancerous cells when they did the biopsy; the MOHS surgery was just an official verification at that point.

Before he died my father-in-law underwent a number of MOHS surgeries because he spent a great deal of time in his younger days outdoors painting houses with little or no sun protection. Most of them were relatively minor--a little off of the shoulder, a little off of the back, and so on--but his doctors eventually had to remove his left ear because the cancer had gone so deep.

Worn well a hat can give gravitas and opprobrium. There's nothing like looking through the gap between the top of the specs and the brim of the hat to bring a miscreant to heel: "My office in ten minutes."
Times I've heard someone say, using the F profanity: "I ******* hate it when he stares at me in that ******* hat!"

Respect the hat!

 

[SGTROCK]

Worn well a hat can give gravitas and opprobrium. There's nothing like looking through the gap between the top of the specs and the brim of the hat to bring a miscreant to heel: "My office in ten minutes."
Times I've heard someone say, using the F profanity: "I ******* hate it when he stares at me in that ******* hat!"

Well said, although I am known to send an e-mail at 0900 directing a meeting at 1500 in order to inflict painful a dose of consternation for six hours.

 

[steur]

After losing quite a bit of weight some years ago I had to get a completely new wardrobe. There was a coat I got, I just could not get to work with a baseball cap. It worked with a fedora and one thing led to another, and another and another...

 

[BlueTrain]

I don't have a fedora but I do wear hats. I'm terribly self-conscious about them, though. I hated the baseball cap in the army and never wore one again until a few years ago when they handed them out at work. I'm wearing it now, in fact, indoors, where it serves as an eyeshade. I'm a shiny-pants bookkeeper by trade and I've always thought I would really look the part with an eyeshade, sleeve protectors, the works.

I also have a Filson mackinaw hat that I wear in cold weather, like it is now. I also have a Barbour waxed-cotton hat that's really very practical and is just as warm as the wool hat in cold weather. I have seen a nice hat at L.L. Bean that I liked but it was more expensive that I'm willing to pay. I'm also not sure about the sizing (even when trying it on) because fit is critical to a nice hat and, well, my hat size seems to change between haircuts. I also have another felt hat that I sometimes wear but it has a cheap headband and isn't real comfortable.

I used to be something of an outdoors person and I still manage to get out in the woods now and then for a pleasant walk in any weather short of a rainstorm. It's been rather cold here lately, well below freezing. That's good, though because it eliminates the mud. Anyway, old "outings" books put a lot of stress on the importance of a hat, as well as neckerchiefs. I wear a neckerchief, too, by the way. But the preferred hat was a felt hat and it always sounded like it should be a rather heavy thing, too.

I was never interested in cowboy hats. But I see them fairly often, always being worn by someone from south of the border.

 

[Zoukatron]

Hmm... The first real hat I bought was a cotton country hat down in the New Forest (southern England) in the 90s. I bought it kind of on a whim, but also because I was doing lots of outdoor stuff, so thought it would be useful (and although not waterproof, I did come to appreciate the little bit of protection it did give in the rain). I was doing volunteer work in Greece one particularly hot summer a year or so later, didn't wear the hat one day, promptly got sunstroke, and then never took it off again in hot sunny weather.

About ten years ago I kind of had a life change in the way I wanted to dress and present myself. Whilst I don't seek to dress like someone in the past, I did come to appreciate the principles and patterns that led to the creation of different formal dress code more casual forms of clothing. Wearing a hat whilst outdoors is just a natural part of that, and completes an outfit.

As such, these days I normally wear flat caps. I love them, I love how they look, I love how they look on me, I love how they complete my (relatively formal for this day and age) outfits. I also love homburgs, although I will only wear one when I want to look really dressy. Aside from panamas, I don't really go for trilbies/fedoras. As much as I do like them, they're just not as practical for me as a flat cap when I'm trying to manhandle a massage table onto the London underground when I'm doing home visits with clients.

I think for many people, the practicalities associated with proper brimmed hats will be an issue, regardless of how popular of socially accepted they are (and I do see more and more people from all walks of life wearing them in London these days). Hopefully that will change with time.

 

[belfastboy]

I started loosing my hair years ago. One Christmas, many years ago, when my wife was helping our small children decide what to ge daddy, my son suggested a hat. I liked it and that was that.

Congrats on raising such a smart kid!

 

[GLewis]

I started wearing hats because I fry when I go fishing! I hate sunscreen, so I bought an Akubra Territory! That'll keep the sun off your face. Later, I had a job at a school where I had to watch the munchkins on their lunch break, so I bought an Akubra Adventurer because I thought it would be "more professional." Now it's odd to NOT wear a fedora!

 

[Tiki Tom]

True confession about when I did NOT start wearing a fedora: It was 1981 and I had recently seen Raiders of the Lost Ark. At the time I had a floor sales job at JC Penny. I was working my way through college. Anway, they had some promotion in which they were selling some vaguely Indiana-Jonesesque items. One of those items was an inexpensive Khaki fedora-type hat with a layered hatband that looked vaguely like it belonged on Safari. Since I got an employee discount, I bought it! However... I NEVER wore it. I was too young and was very self conscious about looking like an Indy-wanna-be. End of story. I kept that hat for years and never wore it.

When I DID finally start wearing fedoras was when I turned 50 and my wife gave me one (a nice fur felt hat) for my B-day. Suddenly I realised that I had the creases, greying facial hair, and grown-up carriage to pull it off. The look is now a natural part of who I am.

 

[dkstott]

I think that I've always worn a hat of some type during my 64 years. Mostly baseball caps during my teens and 20's along with the US Navy hats. Somewhere in my 30's, I started exploring Fedoras and wore them on a regular basis.

These days, it's a baseball cap for my 5 mile morning jog. Then for the remainder of the day, it's either a newsboy or fedora depending on my mood and the weather.

 

[Pellie]

I started wearing fedora's because i didn't like caps anymore. This happens when i gets older. I'm not very old (47), but baseball caps don't suit me imho. Later i was getting the information about the history of the fedora and i became more interested in it. I now own several hats, but only 4 custommade bespoke hats. The whole process of making them, makes me want more of them. I also think it looks very classy to wear fedora's. I hope the 20's-60's will return. In the netherlands it's still not the fashion, but i see more and more people wearing hats. So that's a good start i think.