How hat fashion has evolved throughout history - Alison L. Goodrum

In 1937, renowned fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli unveiled one of her most famous creations: a black stiletto with a pink heel. What made this seemingly ordinary piece so noteworthy was that it was designed to sit on top of a woman’s head. Created in collaboration with Salvador Dalí, Schiaparelli’s bizarre shoe hat was celebrated as an iconic contribution to the Surrealist art movement. Humans have been fashioning caps since the dawn of civilization. A simple bearskin cap from the Bronze Age is one of the earliest surviving hats, discovered in the Alps alongside Europe’s oldest mummy, Ötzi the Iceman. But we’ve found images of hats that are much older: some believe that the “Venus of Willendorf,” a Paleolithic figurine made around 30,000 years ago, is the earliest known depiction of woven headgear. Hats aren’t just for keeping heads warm; they can also be used to make political statements. Take the pileus cap, a favorite among ancient Romans and Greeks. In the Roman Republic, pileus caps were given to previously enslaved people as a public sign of their freedom and came to symbolize the ideals of personal and political liberty. In the 18th century, American and French revolutionaries seemed to have conflated the pileus with the very similar-looking Phrygian cap, embracing the Phrygian as an emblem of their cause. This is reflected in renderings of Marianne, a personification of the French Republic, who often wears a red Phrygian. Hats have also been an essential accessory for projecting status and power. In Western Europe in the 15th century, nothing conveyed royal excess quite like the hennin. Popular among the women of the Burgundy Court, these bejeweled headdresses were crafted from expensive silks and included variations like a flat-topped design and the daring double-coned escoffion. Hat height was restricted according to social rank: while princesses could sport meter-high hennins, noblewomen were limited to much shorter styles. And they weren’t without their critics; hennins were often targeted by clerics and moralists who found their flashy designs impious. Nearly a century later, Suleiman the Magnificent, the longest-reigning sultan of the Ottoman Empire, became known for his bold military campaigns and even more audacious headgear. His grand bulb-shaped turbans were adorned with sparkling sprays of diamonds or feathers. His collection also included a grand four-tiered golden helmet, though some historians suspect it wasn’t actually designed for wearing. Rather, the crown was crafted to flaunt his immense power and wealth to his rivals. For other caps, the real story lies in their making. The sleek British top hat was first introduced in the early 19th century as powdered wigs fell out of fashion. Originally crafted from the fur of animals like beavers, hat makers would soak the material in vats filled with toxic mercuric nitrate to improve the felts quality and density. But prolonged exposure to the chemical in poorly ventilated spaces led many hatters to develop mercury poisoning, suffering symptoms like irritability, slurred speech, memory problems, and tremors. The figure of the Mad Hatter, immortalized in Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland,” is a popular reference to this devastating plight. Thankfully, in the late 1800s, as more people became aware of the dangers of mercury, many countries began to ban its use. Over the following century, top hats, bowlers, and bonnets largely fell out of fashion as everyday wear, but one cap proves that hats are still big business: the baseball cap. What began as a practical part of a baseball uniform stepped off the field and onto the streets in the 1960s. The cap’s cost-effective, adjustable design, along with its easy integration of logos, badges, and trademarks, has driven its mass commercialization. In the United States, some estimate that baseball caps alone make up around 80% of the entire hat market. But as for the future, who knows what type of hat will capture our hearts— and our heads— next.