Hats!

Last season my fetish was beards, this season, I think I am getting into hats. The main advantage of this is that (a) I don't need three months to grow a hat and (b) an accident with a razor is not likely to fell a hat with one swoop. in fact, I have always been somewhat into hats, but there is a certain affectation about them which I find annoying. Most hat blogs comment how fashionable it is to wear a trilby because Lindsay Lohan or Justin Timberlake are wearing them. Nothing is more off-putting! Instead, I think the style icons should be like this chap here, a guy snapped on the streets of New York by one of my favourite voyeuristic blogs Advanced Style. Now there is inspiration!

Of course being almost entirely ignorant of different styles of hats, I thought a bit of education is in order, so here is my idiots' guide to different brimmed hats:

The Fedora
The top of the hat, the crown, has deep creasing on the sides or the top. The brim is broad and often turned down in the front. A typical fedora is as seen on Indiana Jones, or if you are into the whole film noir genre then most any detective with a trench coat is also wearing a fedora.

The Trilby
Like the fedora, the trilby has a similar crown which is pinched. Unlike the fedora, however, the brim is much shorter and may be worn turned up at the back. Inspector Clouseau is your typical trilby hat wearer. A variant of the trilby is the stingy-brim tribly which has a brim much more like a pork pie hat (see below). The stylish gentleman at the top of this post is wearing a stingy-brim trilby, as indeed is the hat pictured here.

The Pork Pie
This hat looks like a pork pie, hence its name. The brim is thin, and the crown is short, rounded and flat-topped. The indentation goes all the way around the hat.