You know what's amazing about hats?

[GregNYC]

[comments from a newbie!!]

It's amazing that such slight differences cut and design can say such vastly different things. It's as though hats are extremely sensitive symbols of a wide variety of masculine life.

Here in NYC, a black hat in a high crown and a wide brim can look like an Othodox Jew. But add a bit more rake to it, and you look like The Shadow. Trim too much off, and you look like Gene Hackman's no-style porkpie-wearing harried cop in French Connection. Brim down, Indiana. Brim up, doofus. Snapped just right, Humphrey. Too silvery, a banker. No pinch in the crown, fat-cat bigwig. Top creased, well-heeled P.I. Top with a rounded contour, down-at-heels P.I. or newspaper reporter.

It goes on and on!

[Biltmore Bob]

That's what I like...a new member diving in with both feet.

Good to have you...

[spiridon]

Good observations Greg. I have a question that fits into that same "fashion" arena....
Has anyone here ever been convinced that they looked great in a certain style only to be told by most of your friends that it just wasn't quite "right"?
In the end it is yor own opinion that really matters.....but did the comments of friends play any part in possibly changing your mind?

[indyjim]

I thought my tall crowned Indy fedoras looked pretty good on me, but my wife thought they were too tall. Now when I wear a lower crown she says,"Ewwww"
So I was right all along
Welcome GregNYC! True, hats make the man.

[GregNYC]

Has anyone here ever been convinced that they looked great in a certain style only to be told by most of your friends that it just wasn't quite "right"?

Yes, it's happened to me many times. I think it's how we all get educated and acculturated to what we like, through the feedback of others. I see it as a give and take.

The biggest shock to my style system came in my youth, when I lived at the beach during the year but on a ranch in the summer. Surfer vs. cowboy - both are great classic American styles, but you can't take your wardrobe from one to the other arena. And of course that inclued hats. In Oregon, on the ranch and in town, a western hat was de rigueur. At the beach, you looked like a gigolo!!

[Feraud]

I thought my tall crowned Indy fedoras looked pretty good on me, but my wife thought they were too tall. Now when I wear a lower crown she says,"Ewwww"
So I was right all along
Welcome GregNYC! True, hats make the man.

Yep. I feel really odd when I try on a hat that has a short brim or low crown. I need my Indy hat!

[Colonel]

I see photos of some Fedoras being worn with the back brim snapped up and some with it down. I talked to my 92-year-old father about hats, and he said he always wore his with the brim snapped down. Is this a regional thing or just an individual style, or what? (The hat I have is the Stetson Temple in brown - Dad said his looked like that, but was grey.)

Thanks for any replies.

Good day and God Bless.

[Biltmore Bob]

Only up in back...always. It doesn't look right any other way.