Joshbru3
I'll Lock Up
- Messages
- 4,409
- Location
- Chicago, IL
Hello everyone,
After watching an old 30's black and white movie today, I got inspired to try my hand at recreating a fedora that looks like it could have come out of that time. I first took a 1950's Barister fedora that had big holes in the felt left from pins and numerous stains. Months ago I filled the holes with a combination of felt (donated from the inside of the hat just by sanding with sand paper) and glue. I also sanded the entire body of the hat with several grits of various sandpaper to get rid of any stains and to smooth the felt. The brim was very large and didn't look right on me, so after doing a lot of research on common brim sizes in the late 20's or early 30's, I decided to trim the brim down to a 2 1/8 inch width. I took time and used a tailors measuring tape to mark a dot in pencil every 2 inches around the brim in order to get the correct width all the way around. After cutting the brim, I sanded the edge very carefully with different grits. Unbound, unwelted, raw brims were very common in the 20's and 30's and I really love that look. But really the true authentic touch that I had to add was the frayed ribbon. I really love the look of the early bowlers and fedoras with frayed ribbon. I studied an early 20's bowler that I have and looked very closely to see if I could figure out how the hat makers frayed the ribbon. After testing my method on some scrap ribbon I had, I used a vintage 2 inch ribbon and frayed the ends. Then I sewed the ribbon onto the hat and rebashed the crown. I love the way the hat turned out. I've found that the "C" crown really was becoming popular in the early 30's nd thats why I chose to use that style of crown verses a center dent. The movie that I watched was called "Mad Love" and was made in 1935. I really modeled this hat after the hats that I saw in the film. I hope you all like the hat. Heres some pictures, enjoy:
Before:
After:
After watching an old 30's black and white movie today, I got inspired to try my hand at recreating a fedora that looks like it could have come out of that time. I first took a 1950's Barister fedora that had big holes in the felt left from pins and numerous stains. Months ago I filled the holes with a combination of felt (donated from the inside of the hat just by sanding with sand paper) and glue. I also sanded the entire body of the hat with several grits of various sandpaper to get rid of any stains and to smooth the felt. The brim was very large and didn't look right on me, so after doing a lot of research on common brim sizes in the late 20's or early 30's, I decided to trim the brim down to a 2 1/8 inch width. I took time and used a tailors measuring tape to mark a dot in pencil every 2 inches around the brim in order to get the correct width all the way around. After cutting the brim, I sanded the edge very carefully with different grits. Unbound, unwelted, raw brims were very common in the 20's and 30's and I really love that look. But really the true authentic touch that I had to add was the frayed ribbon. I really love the look of the early bowlers and fedoras with frayed ribbon. I studied an early 20's bowler that I have and looked very closely to see if I could figure out how the hat makers frayed the ribbon. After testing my method on some scrap ribbon I had, I used a vintage 2 inch ribbon and frayed the ends. Then I sewed the ribbon onto the hat and rebashed the crown. I love the way the hat turned out. I've found that the "C" crown really was becoming popular in the early 30's nd thats why I chose to use that style of crown verses a center dent. The movie that I watched was called "Mad Love" and was made in 1935. I really modeled this hat after the hats that I saw in the film. I hope you all like the hat. Heres some pictures, enjoy:
Before:
After:
