Cloche hat... ladies have a look!

[Matt Deckard]

The twenties were a time of bobbed hair and deep fitting hats for ladies. I found this a while ago and now that we have some women hanging around I thought I would show it off.
Good quality vintage women's hats are hard to find because alot of them were made for fleeting fashion trends and the quality is usually far below that of a man's hat. fur felt versions are even harder to find. I usually see wool ladies hats.

Here are some pics of a Woman's Knox fur felt roll-up hat from the twenties. There is a stitched seem across the top which allows the woman to easliy roll the hat up for storing in a purse.

Unlike mens hats, womens hats from the day had the bow on the right side instead of the left, kind of like how women's blowse buttons are on the left when a man's shirt buttons are on the right.

Extremely thin and extremely floppy.

[jamespowers]

That is very cool! I like it. Compact yet fashionable.
I have seen a Borsalino example but never a Knox. Thanks for posting it. I'm always interested in something that I have not come in contact with before.

Regards,

J

[K.D. Lightner]

Thanks, Matt for showing the vintage ladies hat. I see that style, still, and wish I looked good in them. I think I have seen photos of Greta Garbo in hats like that. One similar style even showed up on ebay recently and was called The Garbo.

But, I've never seen a roll-up hat in a box like that. That is really cool.

karol

[Andykev]

Ok I have NEVER seen one of those, not in books, or old ads.

Hummmmm

I remember when someone made me taller in the pic in front of Art's store.

Is this the same magic?

[jamespowers]

He is not joking. There were some cloches for women and travel hats for men. The attached ad shows a travel hat for men. Very interesting. I would like to find one but they are few and far between now. I think most people just threw away the tube and kept the hat out. They could be tricky to get just right because they were very pliable felt (yes, I know; duh J they would have to be to fit in the tube. ) Perish the thought that they threw both of them away.
I think Art has a few of these--if I remember correctly.

Regards to all,

J

[K.D. Lightner]

So, they had them for men, too.

I wonder, did the hat really look that good after being stored in a roll?

karol

[jamespowers]

Yep, they had travel hats for men as well.
It remains to be seen if they look as good as the poicture when worn though.

[Wild Root]

I can testify that it does! Matt has shown me how his "Bone Borsy" is roll-up! He has rolled it and shown me that hit looks the same after he unrolls it! If the felt is soft enough and thick, so it won?｢どｨび｢t change it. He just unrolls it, opens the crown then hand bash it. Walla! It?｢どｨび｢s like nothing ever happened to it!

The ladies hats are very hard to find from the 20's and early 30's heck, even early 40's hats are rare! Most of the women's hats I see are from the late 50's and early 60s. Blah, not as cool as the early ones! Most of the vials are ripped off or wrinkled badly.

Matt, cool stuff for sure! Let?｢どｨび｢s see some more when you're PC is feeling well again. LOL

Root.

[Andykev]

OH! I did not doubt the roll up hats, esp. the Borsalino..travel hats. But I have NEVER seen that shape of hat box. I know the Montecristi Optimo's come in the little balsa boxes...

I thought someone "stretched" the hat box picture.

My most unique hat box is the Stetson Stratoliner, a real oval shaped...but your Knox "tube box" , I haven't even seen one at Art's.

[Matt Deckard]

The box is real alright.
Lock hatters still sells tubes with their roll-up trilbys.

I had a Lee water block hat that I had an ad where it showed the guy rolling up his hat too, different than the ad above. I rolled my Lee up on many occasions, even packed it away on trips and it came out fine in the end... not even wrinkles.

I think you can do this with many vintage felts as long as the felt is of a quality that won't crack and has a good memory to it. remember, not all hats take kindly to rolling to be cautious.

I freaked my brother out when I wore my lightweight graphite Optimo to Disneyland earlier this year. He kept telling me I'll wreck my hat. I took the hat and crushed it in front of him, then I uncrushed it popped out the crown, pushed half in on itself and rolled it. I told him its felt and it can take abuse.

I was happy that it could. The hat was no worse for the wear. As long as you don't get a fold crease in the brim or roll it too tightly it should not damage the felt. I was taking a risk with a modern hat and don't really recomend this for Optimos.

I used to think that it was only the super soft felts that were rollable, though my Lee water block was a pretty sturdy hat. I don't think there is anything special with Lee felt that made it rollable, I think it was something you could do with alot of hats. Lee just used it as a sales point... speculation.