The fedora hat is a hat with a flat brim and a concave crown in the middle. At the front of the hat, there are two symmetrical depressions called "hat eyes". Usually when we put on and take off hats, we often use our thumb and ring finger to pinch the eye of the hat, while the index finger and middle finger are placed on the front part of the hat head. Another feature of the Fedora hat that lets you quickly identify it is that the top of the crown of a fedora hat is shaped only by a waterdrop or a diamond. there is also a flat-brimmed hat with a collapsed top, also known as a fedora, but this shape is less common than the two above.
As a ordinary customer, maybe it is a little difficult to speak out the name of the hat even you really like it. This is quite understandable. In this article, We try to compare some common hat types similar to fedora with fedora to help consumers better understand fedora and also recognize some other hat types.
Trilby is a narrow-brimmed type hat. If you just compare the shape of the top of the hat crown between the fedora and the trilby, you must be confused since they have the same shape. The main difference of them is at the hat brim. The typical characteristic of a trilby is that the back part of the brim of a trilby is up-turn shaped but the front part always keep flat. That’s why we can identify trilby at a glance.
The porkpie hat got its name from its telescoped crown which features a slight lip around the upper edge of the crown and therefore looks similar to a traditional English meat pie. Traditional hats are narrow brim, as mentioned, fit the shape characteristics of pork cakes. However, the modern porkpie hat design expands the width of the brim, and the wide-sided porkpie is also popular among young people, especially women. This is similar to the development trend of fedora. The main difference between porkpie hat and fedora hat is the shape of the hat crown.
Shop Mossant Mens Wide Brim Fedora Hat Telescop Crown
The boater hat was originally a hat often worn by boaters in Venice, Italy when they were punting a boat, so the hat was named after the boater. The original boater is made of straw only, but with the development of The Times, boater as a style design was also made into a felt hat, and there are also many wide brim designs, in the cap shape unchanged. These new models are still called the boater. A typical feature of the boater is that its crown top has a flat shape without indentations and a fedora-like teardrop or dimond shape. If you look at the top of it vertically from top to bottom, you will see a regular circle, not an ellipse.
The cowboy hat is a high-crowned ,wide-brimmed hat best known as the defining piece of attire for the North American cowboy. Centre dent is the classical shape of the cowboy hat and the two “hat eyes” are also located at the top of the crown just beside the dented centre, each side one hat eye is there. This is a big difference with the shape of the crown of a fedora hat. As far as the brim, the brim of the cowboy is not flat, They all have a certain upward angle according to the design of the style.
According to different classification standards, Fedora hat can be divided into different types, and we will introduce these classifications one by one:
The shape of the crown is a typical characteristic to identify the type of the fedora. If you see a hat with one of the three shape styles, you can probably judge it as the fedora hat.
1. Tear Drop Crown Fedora; also known as waterdrop or peach heart, you also probably see the name "C crown" somewhere, don’t doubt, it’s the same shape we are talking about. This C-crown is narrow in the front but more rounded at the back. With the smooth edge there is a more lower profile on the top of the crown. It makes the entire outline looks smooth without angular.
2. Dimond Crown Fedora. This look is almost recognizable at a glance, as it has four folds different from other smooth-looking shapes. A raised point in the crown head section is connected to the three raised points at the back end of the hat by deliberately shaped folds, and the overall pattern resembles the shape of the kite.
3. Center Dent Crown Fedora. A simple crease extends from the cap head beginning to the back of the hat crown, which forms what we call the “Center Dent” the named source of this shape.
In general, the C-crown and Diamond shape are more used by designers among the many fedora hat styles.
Let’s change to another angle, fedoras can also be referred based on the size of the brim. In this sense, Fedoras can be roughly divided into narrow brim fedora, medium brim fedora and wide brim fedora.
1. Narrow Brim Fedora : this part is referred the width of the brim between 4cm to 6cm ( 1.5inch to 2.4inch) which is favored by most Asian users and traditional European users as well as older male users.
2. Middle Brim Fedora: we definite the width of the brim around 6cm to 8cm (2.4inch to 3.15inchs)as the Middle Brim Fedora. This part of the style is the most numerous and appears most frequently among various popular styles, which is more suitable for North American people.
3. Wide Brim Fedora: If the width of the brim around 8cm to 10cm , in modern era even reach 12cm , we call it Wide Brim Fedora. From a practical point of view, a large brim can better protect the face from the sun; on the other hand, a wide brim will look more fashionable with appropriate clothing, so it is more popular with women.
Fedora hats also be found some differences when it come to their edges. Let’s introduce in detail below:
1. Row Edge Fedora Hat: the edge of the brim just remain the state while it is cut off and left unfinished.
2. Bound Edge Fedora Hat: this part we are talking about is the decoration of the edge but not the brim. Mostly , the grosgrain and the cotton fabric will be used to binding the edge as the protection and decoration of the edge.
3. Floded Edge Fedora Hat: there are two types of edge in this part , one is called overwelt edge , you can get it when you turn the raw edge up 1cm and sew it back on the brim; another type is called "underwelt “ which is also known as “cavanagh” edge , once you roll the raw edge down to the underbrim and resewn on the brim, you will get it.
The earliest fedora hat is made of felt , but as the time goes on , more materials such as many kinds of straw ,some of animal furs are also be used to the fedora design.
1. Felt Fedora Hat: Normally , the felt is made of wool which various grades can be choose. For example, there are general wool, superfine wool and cashmere in wool. Fedora hats made of different grade wool will have a certain gap in terms of appearance and wearing comfort.
2. Animal Fur Fedora Hat：Animal fur is also soft and has a more delicate texture that differs slightly from wool. They can be made from beaver or rabbit fur or more expensive and exotic furs like a chinchilla. Typically, animal felt fedoras are worn in upmarket environments and fit right in highly formal environments.
3. Straw Fedora Hat： To wear a felt fedora hat for sporting event or outdoor wedding in the hot season sunshine is distressing. Making the fedora hat with the sort of straw can solve the problem above. The most common straw hats are Raffia straw hat, paper straw hat, Panama straw hat,etc.
1. Soft body fedora hat
The original meaning of the name “Fedora” is the soft felt hat. All Fedora hat are soft body, and most styles retain this original feature. Especially the traveller hat in fedora hat, its outstanding feature is crushable. So when you travel, you can safely fold it arbitrarily into backpacks and suitcases. Its shape can be easily restored after you reach your destination.
2. Stiff body fedora hat
In terms of maintaining the shape of the hat, many people have extremely strict requirements, which is also the basis for the appearance of the rigid Fedora hat. After adding viscose to the felt and air-drying the soft hat body, the corresponding part will have a certain hardness. The hardened part can be only the brim, and in some styles both the crown and the brim are designed to be stiff; the degree of stiffness can be roughly divided into three levels: low, medium and high according to the design requirements. As you can imagine, the harder the part, the better the retention of its original shape.
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