National Hat Day 2019

Hat Haul

"You won with a £31.98 bid" is not always good thing until you get the items however when you manage to get a job lot of hats eBay for a reasonable price you hope to get at least a few that make the bid worth it.

This bunch of 20 odd hats worked out to about £ 1.50 each

However out the selection, only 12 were worth keeping and only 9 would I have bought separately, even so, that still about £ 3.50 each which is still a bargain and of those at least 2 of which I would have paid £10 plus to buy individually.

Of the bad are these Mikey mouse ears and heart-shaped deely boppers

Along with the eye patch and foil wrapped cardboard Egyptian style circlet, these were all part of the giveaways

In the good pile several woolen, felt and cloth caps that were well made and well worth it.

Then we have those that fall between, the female headdress below was children's size so given away.

The Red Indian style headband is a bit rubbish but I ended up keeping it

Overall in the good box, I got an excellent felt fez, 3 muffin caps, 2 pillbox/smoking caps, a musketeers hat, another fabric fez and a skull cap, plus in the ok pile a jester hat, the red Indian headband above and sequined bandanna 

Beanie to Snood

One of the great uses of beanie hats is to make snoods, most of the £2 beanie hats from the supermarket are a tube of machine knitted fabric rolled over and stitched together at the top. Unpick the top or just cut the top off and you have a long tube of stretchy fabric which become an instant cheap snood.

Snoods are mainly used in lrp especially by the crew who need quick changes. They are used to hide the edges of masks and cover the neck where the mask ends saving makeup.

Cheap beanie plain colour, cheaper the better usually.

Feel for the double layer of fabric.

Unpick the top, or cut or tears if you want it quick.

This leaves a tube of fabric.

Stretch over your head

until around your neck.

Then pull up over your head, usually with you mask already on as below.

The rough unfinished edges you get from unpicking or tearing, just add to the effect.

100th Hat Blogged

I've now blogged about 100 hats, so here is collage of the hats so far

I have plenty more to follow.

One Hat Many Styles

From a basic wide brimmed felt hat you can change its look into many other styles. 

The photos below are all the same £5 felt hats from Primark, all created with quick stitch, you can cut and decorate to make many more better looks. 

Below the basic black felt hat as you buy it.

Below a Bicorn

Below a Tricorn

Below almost a Quadricorn, it needed a wider brim really, but 4 points were almost achieved.

Below a Yokel Hat

PS these were all purchased for £1 at the end of the season by my friend Dave who the master of spotting a bargain.

Buying a Hat

This post is not about what style of hat to pick when you don't want another baseball cap, what looks best is ultimately a personal choices so this is about what you should look out for, where to find your hat and what to pay.

Why are you buying a hat

I use hats for general use in the modern world, Medieval reinactment/Living History and most often Live action roleplay/LARP

Hats are fashionable, most are very comfortable, some keep you warm, shaded or dry, hats say something combined with the rest of your clothing they set scene and persona in the viewers mind before you even speak.

I used to do mummers plays and all that I changed between characters was the hat, some hats are evil, posh, good, dumb, poor, old, young, inquisitive, authoritative many other things.

Hats can also be job or hobby, related such white plastic safety hats construction, riding hats, flying caps, cowboy hats etc.
And they can represent a country hats with corks around them say your Australian, the tam o'shanter Scottish, the sombrero Mexican etc.

Where to Buy From

This easiest place to find your hat is the internet, but to get a good fit, feel for the quality and most importantly check if its the right hat for you then the only way is to try it on and thus the internet fails.

However you can finds hats in other places such as at fairs, car boot sales, charity shops and antique/vintage shops, most of my hats have come form reenactment and larp markets like 

TORM

 National Living History Fair

 Internations Living History Fair

What's your Games

Larp Awareness Party

Tewkesbury Medieval Festival

To name a few, I'm sure there are many more around the county or world.

Size

Soft hats are usually stretchy or one size fits all even so some are way to small for my head, for hard or rigid hats its essential you know your size, if you already own hats you can get the size from that if its on the label, if not use the guide below.

Personally I find most hats size labels are in cm (centimetres) but the modern way means you now get small, medium, large and extra large, large seems to be around 58cm but you really never can tell for sure so as mentioned above try it on.

Use a soft tape measure. Place it around the head, position it mid forehead and above ears. Measure in inches or centimetres. Find your size on the hat size chart.

Inches	20 1/2"	20 7/8"	21 1/4"	21 5/8"	22"	22 1/2"	22 7/8"	23 1/4"	23 5/8"
European or cm	52	53	54	55	56	57	58	59	60
USA	6 1/2	6 5/8	6 3/4	6 7/8	7	7 1/8	7 1/4	7 3/8	7 1/2
UK	6 3/8	6 1/2	6 5/8	6 3/4	6 7/8	7	7 1/8	7 1/4	7 3/8

Don't be generous, be accurate or the hat will fall over your ears. 

Cost

You should be able to pick up a good soft hat or cap, new for under £10 and basic quality rigid/hard hat for £ 30 but I have found a bowler hat in car boots for £ 10 and a leather cap in a charity shop £ 3.

Fancy dress hats are very cheap and if its for a one off use then why not, some are actually very good and real bargain, definitely worth a look on Ebay or Amazon or similar.

For quality hats though you will be paying upwards £50 even second hand, the most I have paid is £90 for hat and it was something I really wanted to make me pay that, I see many hats more much more expensive than that but I always walk by them although sometimes I wish I didn't the following day.

The good thing if your buying historical is many reproduction imports are coming our way and these are well worth a look.