Welcome to the Fedora Lounge (FL), Euroven1930. It is indeed a Fedora. Trilbies can be said to be Fedoras of a smaller stature. Homburgs are a whole different type of hat. It has nothing to do with vintage/antique hats.
Oh wooooow, is this competition in the last part? Crazy…Hat nomenclature can be confusing. If in broad strokes, a fedora is a soft felt brimmed hat then a lot of styles could be called fedoras. To confuse things more, the term “fedora” wasn’t universal in its application and in the UK the term trilby was more common early on for hats we would definitely consider full sized fedoras today. Some manufacturers in the USA just listed them all as soft felt hats to distinguish them from stiff felt hats like the bowler/derby. I think most of us now see the trilby or stingy brim as a style of fedora and not as a separate type of hat as it’s all a matter of degree as far as what distinguishes them. Homburg etc. have universal and unique characteristics that, I believe, put them in a separate categories.
The hat in your photo is a fedora. Similar hats are easy to find in your (our) large hat size. Easy, that is, if you want a new hat factory hat or a new custom hat. Vintage hats are out there, but require a lot of searching and they don’t often come cheap. I’d wish you good luck, but as we’re the same size….
Brent
Thank you for the welcome, I have heard people refer to triblies as fedoras before, but I never thought of it like that. I have one homburg, but my parents think it’s still a fedora. May I ask what you mean by the last part though?
You will be better off using actual measurements--specifically the inner circumference of the hat's crown/sweatband and the circumference of your head--rather than sizing that might not be accurate.
Quite frankly, I don’t like your chances. I’m living in Japan and I see some nice looking vintage hats come up occasionally on the local markets, but I’ve never found one in my size (7⅜), let alone yours. Another thing to consider is that Japanese tend to have rounder heads than the more oval European heads.
Ok, how would I feed that measurement into eBay or a similar website? Like “vintage Japanese fedora xx mm circumference” for example?
It’s ok, don’t be sorry, if nothing comes up, I’ll just numb myself to the interest like I can always do, they were made there during that time, but as most people seem to think, it’s the size that’s going to make it a rarity
It would probably be best to search using your hat size, then verify the measurements with the seller before you make the purchase. The hat might still have it's original size tag, but it would be nearly impossible to know everything that has happened to a fur felt hat from the 1930s/40s that might have caused it to shrink a little or a lot. Keep in mind, not everyone knows how to measure a hat, so the seller's measurements might also be inaccurate. Sad to say, that's just part of the game with vintage hats.
I meant knowing where you were in the world could help in some way.
I posted an eBay link, but I’ll post a Google Images search and the listing again. They’re very similar to a western fedora – Images, Listing – it means exactly what it sounds like, an antique, 1930s or 1940s fedora made in Japan. I apologize if that is not quite obvious, but I can’t tell so easily since I’m the one writing… also, I’m sorry for not responding until today.
yeah, I didn’t think so much about them shrinking, but now that seems quite annoying… I gotta be honest, I’m not much of a vintage hat guy. Vintage anything else? For some reason absolutely, I’m wearing a WW1 Zeppelin jacket right now. But I just can’t see the difference between a stylish hat, and one not so much sometimes.
Lovely looking caps and their Donegal tweed looks amazing. I wish I had room for another as I would buy one of these. You likely know this but remember the difference in British sizing.
Who is the maker in Seville? They make a lot of the Hasidim hats. Is it Selentino? It is a nice looking hat and encouraging that they make one in these dimensions open crown.
