Quote:
The Alpine Hat.
Published: May 28, 1893
Copyright © The New York Times
No person of good taste can view without distrust the revival of the so-called Alpine hat. Last Fall a feeble attempt was made to bring this article of wearing apparel, which is properly described by the hatters as "natty headgear," into use, but it was confined to persons who habitually own more than one hat, and know, moreover, how to use a hat. No possible alarm could be felt at their dalliance with a "natty" article. They have spare money and can afford to gratify their whims. But their example has had an awful effect. This Spring the Alpine hat has become "fashionable," which is to say that the fashionable men having tired of it, and cast it aside, the "general public" has taken it up, and is wearing it on its head.
Any man of sense who can remember the year 1868--which was the last Alpine hat year--will join us in bewailing this ill-advised revival. The soft-felt hat with a well-rounded brim and the crown nicely and evenly indented is a sightly object in a hatter's window. The plea that it is more comfortable to the head than the much-abused pot hat--the derby of commerce--or the high silk hat, is not true; and, if it were true, would not avail. If a man intends to wear a hat merely to please himself he may as well live in Ogdensburg.
Presumably those men who induce hatters to take their Alpine hats out of their windows and exchange them over their counters for money have no such idea. They reason that if the hats look well in the windows, they will look equally well on their heads. But this is folly.
As a matter of fact, while a pot hat improves the appearance of almost any face its brim shades, and a high silk hat would lend dignity to a Brazilian ape, the Alpine hat is rarely becoming. A curled brim is essential to most men. Then an Alpine hat three weeks old is invariably a bad hat. The moisture in the atmosphere affects it, the dust settles in the crease of the crown and will not be brushed away. The felt gets out of shape, and the reckless owner endeavoring to save its appearance changes what was confessedly "natty" into something deplorably "negligee." He punches in the sides, and jabs at the top, until his hat looks like a collapsed balloon, and proceeds on his way frowningly, endeavoring to make others believe he is satisfied with himself and his hat.
For constant use the Alpine hat is as serviceable as the dancing master's chapeau or the baseball cap or the salt-water fisherman's sou'wester. And the unexpectedly-successful revival for everday purposes of soft felt hats, unless it is sternly checked, will lead conscienceless hatters to bring to light other styles of the late "60's"--an era of all kinds of bad taste in dress. We shall have the dreadful telescope hat again, an article quite as "natty" as need be at first, but apt to become "shocking" in less than a week. We shall have modifications of the cowboy's sombrero and the Connecticut farmer's Sunday hat of thin black felt. The cap will come in again, and men will lose all sense of shame.
Let us stop it now and stick, for common use, to the derby, which is the most serviceable, the most comfortable, and the most becoming hat ever invented. The Prince of Wales still wears a derby--favoring a very narrow brim this Summer--and he knows.
Published: May 28, 1893
Copyright © The New York Times
No person of good taste can view without distrust the revival of the so-called Alpine hat. Last Fall a feeble attempt was made to bring this article of wearing apparel, which is properly described by the hatters as "natty headgear," into use, but it was confined to persons who habitually own more than one hat, and know, moreover, how to use a hat. No possible alarm could be felt at their dalliance with a "natty" article. They have spare money and can afford to gratify their whims. But their example has had an awful effect. This Spring the Alpine hat has become "fashionable," which is to say that the fashionable men having tired of it, and cast it aside, the "general public" has taken it up, and is wearing it on its head.
Any man of sense who can remember the year 1868--which was the last Alpine hat year--will join us in bewailing this ill-advised revival. The soft-felt hat with a well-rounded brim and the crown nicely and evenly indented is a sightly object in a hatter's window. The plea that it is more comfortable to the head than the much-abused pot hat--the derby of commerce--or the high silk hat, is not true; and, if it were true, would not avail. If a man intends to wear a hat merely to please himself he may as well live in Ogdensburg.
Presumably those men who induce hatters to take their Alpine hats out of their windows and exchange them over their counters for money have no such idea. They reason that if the hats look well in the windows, they will look equally well on their heads. But this is folly.
As a matter of fact, while a pot hat improves the appearance of almost any face its brim shades, and a high silk hat would lend dignity to a Brazilian ape, the Alpine hat is rarely becoming. A curled brim is essential to most men. Then an Alpine hat three weeks old is invariably a bad hat. The moisture in the atmosphere affects it, the dust settles in the crease of the crown and will not be brushed away. The felt gets out of shape, and the reckless owner endeavoring to save its appearance changes what was confessedly "natty" into something deplorably "negligee." He punches in the sides, and jabs at the top, until his hat looks like a collapsed balloon, and proceeds on his way frowningly, endeavoring to make others believe he is satisfied with himself and his hat.
For constant use the Alpine hat is as serviceable as the dancing master's chapeau or the baseball cap or the salt-water fisherman's sou'wester. And the unexpectedly-successful revival for everday purposes of soft felt hats, unless it is sternly checked, will lead conscienceless hatters to bring to light other styles of the late "60's"--an era of all kinds of bad taste in dress. We shall have the dreadful telescope hat again, an article quite as "natty" as need be at first, but apt to become "shocking" in less than a week. We shall have modifications of the cowboy's sombrero and the Connecticut farmer's Sunday hat of thin black felt. The cap will come in again, and men will lose all sense of shame.
Let us stop it now and stick, for common use, to the derby, which is the most serviceable, the most comfortable, and the most becoming hat ever invented. The Prince of Wales still wears a derby--favoring a very narrow brim this Summer--and he knows.
