Would you like the fedora and related hats to become main stream fashion

[adamgottschalk]

Ditto

I voted yes. I think it would be nice to see more decent hats out there. To me, the look is much more pleasing to the eye than what passes for fashion today. Really couldn't care less about being diferent. Or fitting in. I am me. I'm not trying to be anybody and god help anyone who wants to be me. Their life must be real bad. Admitedly, I normaly don't quite fit in, but that's not my fault or intention. Its everyone else who's a bit off. Me? I'm the normal one.

Leo

I concur explicitly with your sentiments.

 

[Mycroft]

You really lost me with your refference to a counter culture. What counter culture are you referring to? I can recall, "THE counter culture" died of drug over doses and apathy in the 70's." What I ask you, is wrong with wanting to be different? I like being different! And I happen to love hats. I wear a fedora daily wherever I go! I know that my individuality makes a statement to everyone that see's me. Since you brought it up in your post, my love of hats and my preference for being different blend seamlessly! All of the people I know who tend to be different don't have anything vaguely resembling an identy crisis. I don't know silver maybe it's different where you are! Oh by the way welcome to the lounge!

I am with you, I love dressing and acting from another time or just to break the traditional mold. I love wearing my hat and I try to wear as much as I can, in Florida it is kinda frowned apon.

 

[Legal Concepts]

I am with you, I love dressing and acting from another time or just to break the traditional mold. I love wearing my hat and I try to wear as much as I can, in Florida it is kinda frowned apon.

Move up North!

 

[vespasian]

Counter culture is synonymous with coming to a hat forum and running against the stream by having a dig at the members. Did you do it just to stand out?

If I wear a hat for any reason its because I like em, they look smart, theyre warm in winter, they keep me dry, they keep me shaded in summer, they stop my head getting sunburned, frost bitten. The only reason I can think of not to wear one is that few others do wear them, but thats their hard cheese isnt it.

Plus a highly important point for me is that it is a counter culture thing for me too. Counter to the insolent, rude, selfish, me me me, human rights (individual more important than the mass or the state) want it now, step over you if youre bleeding culture that seems rife amongst society nowadays. It recalls the era of the gentleman, of the polite (also once intolerant so it wasnt all roses), and I like it.

One last word to those who just follow the flock. Baa Baa, bleet bleet, baa. Translated as "If you werent so self obsessed with how the flock would see you, you too would wear a nice hat occasionally.)

Anyway, hello Halo. Welcome to the forum.

 

[Senator Jack]

It seems that all those who wear fedoras now because it is so called "counter-culture" or just to be different,

And so it begins. Thanks Ashton!

Seriously, does anyone really believe that the adopotion of the fedora by the great unwashed is going to invoke a new appreciation for comportment? People are still going to be self-centered, rude and stupid, but now they'll just be doing it under a different hat. Look at the junk we get from the pea-brained Kutschner (Spelling? I can't be bothered) Beauty and the Geek, Punked. Has the fedora made him any smarter? Has it graduated him from typical male-American fifth-grade thinking?

Most of the members here have the whole package: the clothes, the accoutrements, the comportment. Joe Blow in his new fedora is not going to make him Fred Astaire in the same way the baseball cap hasn't made anyone Joe DiMaggio. And the problem isn't that you're going to be lumped in with the great unwashed when the fedora fad hits, it's that you're going to be thought of as seriously out of style when it passes in six months. Believe me, I still go through this with the narrow necktie. (Which I also expected to make a comeback but didn't)

Regards,

Senator Jack

 

[adamgottschalk]

The Great Unwashed

And so it begins. Thanks Ashton!

Seriously, does anyone really believe that the adopotion of the fedora by the great unwashed is going to invoke a new appreciation for comportment? People are still going to be self-centered, rude and stupid, but now they'll just be doing it under a different hat. Look at the junk we get from the pea-brained Kutschner (Spelling? I can't be bothered) Beauty and the Geek, Punked. Has the fedora made him any smarter? Has it graduated him from typical male-American fifth-grade thinking?

Most of the members here have the whole package: the clothes, the accoutrements, the comportment. Joe Blow in his new fedora is not going to make him Fred Astaire in the same way the baseball cap hasn't made anyone Joe DiMaggio. And the problem isn't that you're going to be lumped in with the great unwashed when the fedora fad hits, it's that you're going to be thought of as seriously out of style when it passes in six months. Believe me, I still go through this with the narrow necktie. (Which I also expected to make a comeback but didn't)

Regards,

Senator Jack

Your post brought a smile to my face. Do you mind if I incorporate your phrase "the great unwashed" into my own vocabulary (did you get it somewhere of coin it yourself?)?

We've all been seeing small signs for some time of some mutant return of the fedora. I think the snowball is rolling faster down the hill now. Last night on CSI (I really don't watch TV Faye Dunaway (!) was wearing this very striking white fedora in one scene, very prominent in the scene. Later, one of the regular cast donned a fedora (didn't look like a very good one) before he left work. Now, being that so many millions watch that show, and that it has a cult-like following, I'd imagine that one episode alone will cause a spike (however brief) in fedora sales. The whole episode was kind of themed on "the old days", when Frank and fedoras were king. If a bunch of women, er, ladies, started walking around tomorrow with fly white hats like Faye had on last night, I think I'd be a very happy man.

 

[Raindog]

I've always been 'counter' and I always will be 'counter'
If everybody followed the 'Sheeple' of the world we'd still be thinking the earth was flat, still be sacrificing people to Moloch, and all be whipped for failing to tug our forelocks to the lord of the manor.
I love hats, I like being different. In the thirties I might well have worn something other than the fedora, but I bet I'd have ended up with something made of fur felt. You can't beat the stuff.
As Churchill once said "A good arguement against democracy is to have a conversation for five minutes with the average man in the street"...Or something like that anyway....
I want to be different to the 'average man in the street'. Luckily for me the average man wears crappy cotton baseball caps and wool bucket hats. I don't want him to start wearing fedoras, he doesn't deserve it!

Jeff.

 

[Paisley]

Hello. I read about this site in the Denver Post and really enjoy the people and topics here.

I voted yes for a couple of reasons. First, if fedoras (or nice hats in general) were more popular, there would end up being more of them on the market. Of course, at first, prices would go up because of demand. But if they became the style, not just a brief trend, stores would eventually stock more of them and in more sizes, colors, styles, prices, etc.

I also think that, celebrities aside, people do act and feel a little differently depending on how they dress and groom themselves on a given day. (Maybe celebs do too, but they get press for being obnoxious.)

 

[Siirous]

Welcome to the Lounge Paisley! :cheers1:

It's good to see that article was read and appreciated by someone.

The main reason I'm concerned about the fedora becoming mainstream is that you'll get a mass produced low quality hat. The average person that would want to "go out on a limb" and try a real hat will go into a mens clothing store, throw down 50 dollars for a wool felt and be disappointed when the dyes run and the hat shrinks in the rain. The general public won't understand or appreciate the finer hats that are made with fur felts, leather sweatbands and satin liners.

I guess I'm trying to say that when people are trying something as fine as a fedora out for the first time, I worry they'll get a bad first impression and go back to the $9.99 baseball cap to save their money.

Sincerely,
Rob

 

[Renderking Fisk]

No, with conditions...

Well, let’s see… I run a news site called “The Fedora Chronicles,� I own about 4 fedoras, wear one everyday, I despratly wish some of the style and substance of the Golden Era would return along with respect and common sense… and I wish men and women would start acting more like men and women and grow back-bones again…

So, I’m going to surprise the crap out of a lot of people when I say “No,� I don’t want fedora’s to become main-stream again. One of my fundemental beliefs is that there are more people out there who are more like us, the people who would rather go to the Brattle Theater in Cambridge Massachusetts and see a vintage classic with a room full of other vintage aficionados… rather then see the next mega-blockbuster at the cinemaplex. Those people just don’t know how to find websites like ours and vendors like Steve and Art. I have no idea why, maybe they don’t know how to look or are afraid that they won’t find what they’re looking for… who knows.

I would rather have EVERYONE who wants one to be able to get one and wear them on a regular basis. I would like these styles to be more accessible to those people who are out there en-mass to be able to find what they are looking for.

What I’m saying is that I want these styles to be more accessible to the people who WANT THEM, not to have everyone gobble up what’s availbe because it’s the “IN� thing for the summer, just because Britney’s pet husband wore one while tramping around town.

With that said, and reading jkath’s first post… I’m thinking maybe we should all move to Chicago, or have a piece of Chicago move closer to me.

 

[vespasian]

I'm on the middle ground really with the fedora for the masses debate. I would probably prefer people to be a bit more mature about things full stop, though I think society could do with a bit of styling up. Its not about what a person wears but the etiquette that goes with it. The hat for me is reminiscent of a gentlemans age where it was tipped to a lady etc. A few rules that society chooses to adopt because it makes people act better and think better, about each other rather than self. The identity crisis isnt about folk who wear hats, its the identity crisis in society. I do remember a time growing up when we had street parties for a royal wedding, in the age before the mass slagging off of the royals became the "in thing." I dont act differently because of the hat, I want people to see that Im different by wearing something that recalls a better time. Yes it is a middle finger to the selfish masses. To be honest in my work I spend the majority of my time dealing with the pits and filth of society and my fedora, my smart suit, my open the door for a woman, my remove my hat in an elevator when a woman enters, my "thankyou" whenever I get served by someone in a shop, my saying good morning to people I pass in the street (and believe me the looks I sometimes get for doing that in the South of the country), are all indicators that I know exactly who I am. As for the majority of people I come across, they dont have a clue who or what they are because they just following the bleating flock. Ignorance for the masses, get your prescription from your newsvendor and from the telly today. Wont cost you much but will make your brain dribble just as well as pot or lsd.

 

[vespasian]

Cant argue with your point there Halo. It makes more sense than many I suppose, just wearing them because you like them is probably the best reason I can think of, certainly the simplest. The reason I wear mine is the same for 90 percent of it, but I do love the message I hope it sends. I do sincerely believe that fashion fits the mood and people do dress like their icons for more reasons than merely style. Take the brit pop fashions paraded by the likes of the Gallagher brothers and so forth. The music, the style, the attitude all screams of insolence and arrogance, the walk with a swagger style and couldnt give a $%£&, me me me. Whereas look at Gene Kelly and the other icons of the day. Extremely polite, smiling, dashing, do a days work, chivalrous attitude. I think we wear clothes like we wear a smile or a frown, or a grimmace, even if we dont conciously aim for that look when we open the wardrobe, clothes are the mood because we choose them when we are in a certain mood.

 

[Clint_Southwood]

It seems that all those who wear fedoras now because it is so called "counter-culture" or just to be different, would be doing the exact same thing as someone wearing a baseball cap 60 years ago would do to "stand out" and be different in the sea of fedoras... remember that it wasn't too long ago that nearly everyone wore hats (some form or another). It seems to me that these fellows have more of an identity crisis than a love of just fine hats.

When I said, "Right now it takes people who really like the hats and have the Balls to sport one because they are not afraid to be different", I didn't mean that the only reason to where a fedora is to be different. I meant that right now when most people see you wearing a fedora they may think your a joke and sometimes they may ridicule you because you don't fit the mold. I'm saying that the people who wear these hats don't care what other people think and are therefore not subject to their ridicule. They have the "Balls" to not care what others think and to do what makes them happy. I just wouldn't like it if it became a mainstream FAD, only to be tossed away after a few months after everyone is done using it. Then when your still wearing your hat, you will have people telling you "that was so last week." We still wouldn't care what these people are saying, but we would get pretty tired of hearing it. Now if it could become a real fashion shift for the long-term, then that would be a different story.

Now if a persons sole intent was ONLY to be different so that they will "stand out", not that they really liked these fine quality hats and would happily trade it for a ball cap if fedoras went mainstream, then I would have to agree with you. And you have seemed to clear this up in your most recent post. You also say, "Hat's have always been an expression of individuality of the wearer". That's the point I was trying to get across, not that fedora's should only be worn to be different. However, at first I do think you were trying to put a few of us down here in the lounge. I think you judged us a little too quickly. Anyway, welcome to the lounge :cheers1:

 

[Raindog]

Welcome Silverhalo You've certainly kicked this thread into life again:cheers1:
I think most of the people here are also just people with good taste in clothes.
If I presented 2 pictures here, one of Bogart in one of his suits wearing a fedora, and the other of a 40 year old man in tracksuit bottoms, trainers, socks rolled up over his shins, and a baseball cap with "Von Dutch" written on it, which photo would make us all retch and quiver like a sea sick landlubber, and which would make us glow with a certain recognition?
Clothes maketh the man, as Shakespeare might have said. If I dressed in the above tracksuited get up, I'd feel inferior, slightly aggressive to smarter dressed people, anti social, slightly dirty, and just generally bad bad bad.
I'm probably making a good case for voting yes, because if everyone dressed smarter it might well make them more polite and better behaved, but I'll still vote no for my own selfish reasons

Jeff.

 

[WEEGEE]

comportment...great word!!!

Most of the members here have the whole package: the clothes, the accoutrements, the comportment. Joe Blow in his new fedora is not going to make him Fred Astaire in the same way the baseball cap hasn't made anyone Joe DiMaggio. And the problem isn't that you're going to be lumped in with the great unwashed when the fedora fad hits, it's that you're going to be thought of as seriously out of style when it passes in six months. Believe me, I still go through this with the narrow necktie. (Which I also expected to make a comeback but didn't)

Regards,

Senator Jack

Senator Jack,


Nothing like a narrow tie with a stingy brim.


I really hate being part of any en masse comeback...but this storm like

many will be weathered. Yet an en masse comeback of comportment would

be welcomed.

 

[Senator Jack]

Asked by Adamsgottschalk -

Do you mind if I incorporate your phrase "the great unwashed" into my own vocabulary (did you get it somewhere of coin it yourself?)?

I wish I could say I did, but I believe this one goes back centuries. Shakespeare? Machiavelli? Proctor & Gamble?

Yeah, Weegee, unfortunately one doesn't here too much about comportment these days, and now re-reading through that post I really ought to have used the word deportment instead. Comportment can either be good or bad, but deportment implies well-mannered and civilized. I try to watch those things, but this one got away.

It's always difficult to see your passion become a nine-day wonder. I'm currently working on an article about vintage cars used as daily drivers, and I got blasted when I asked questions at a site for Darts. "What's this article for? No one should tell him anything, the prices are going to go up on Darts. Everyone will want one!" Of course, one article at a website isn't going to cause a rush on vintage Darts, but I can see how some of the fans were reluctant to talk about it.

I can't side with the 'driving up the price' side, though. If I thought that way, I'd be against everyone who collects vintage clothes. As I've written before, back in the early 80s I was buying 60s suits for a dollar - sometimes a quarter. I blew through probably dozens of them while playing in bands. They were cheap and plentiful and if one got ruined I could replace it with another. At some point in the 90s I saw the prices really start to go up. My usual haunts of Goodwill and Salvation Army were pricing vintage pieces higher, and that's when they carried them. They had got smart, and started hiring vintage pickers. The pieces were taken from the donations and sold at a higher price to vintage wholesalers. Today, I can't believe the asking price of some vintage suits $300 - $400, and they're not even that special. God, I miss those dollar suits.

I suppose in a nutshell, everyone wonders why their favorite restaurant isn't popular, but then complains when it's a success. We're a curious lot all right .

Regards,

Senator Jack

 

[PeeWee]

I'd like to see hats mainstream enough so I could walk into a store near me and buy a serious hat right off the shelf.

 

[Matt Deckard]

I'd rather the fedora be a symbol of style than main stream fashion. If if becomes a fad, good... I think in the long run it will push competition and quality will rise.

 

[Michael Mallory]

I certainly wouldn't mind if fedoras became mainstream again, but I'd accept almost any real kind of hat if it would drive a stake through the ball cap. Every day I see elderly gentlemen walking down the street dressed very elegantly -- suit, vest, tie -- but totally trashing the effect by wearing a ball cap, presumably because that's the only kind of hat they can find and/or afford. I've come close to handing my hat to some of these otherwise dignified fellows, out of mercy.

 

[Matt Deckard]

Just saw one of the Superbowl corespondents wearing a fedora with a wide brim and high crown. I like it. The more the merrier.