The history of Boater

A Boater is a semi-formal summer hat, which was popularised in the late 19th century and early 20th century. The boater was worn by women and children as early as the 1860s, but it wasn’t adopted as a staple of menswear until about 20 years later in the 1880s.  

Beatrice Gigli with our Boater hat.

They are normally made from a type of stiff flat straw referred to as sennit. The finished boater it’s slightly elliptical in shape and It has a stiff flat crown and brim typically with a solid or striped grosgrain ribbon around the crown.This can be any type of flat and naturally colored straw.

 The "Straw Hat Day” is the day when men switched from wearing their winter hats to their summer  hats, it was seen as a sign of the beginning of summer. The exact date of Straw Hat Day might vary slightly from place to place. In 1922 in New York City, the tradition escalated into the Straw Hat Riot, which lasted eight days, involved a mob of 1,000 young hat destroyers at its peak, and resulted in a number of arrests and injuries.

These days, many men are hesitant to wear traditional hat styles for one simple reason: they’re afraid that they’re going to look out of place. Let’s see some advices in order to wear properly the Boater hat: it's correctly worn either inits original setting with a blazer, or with a summer suit of matching jacket and trousers.

What do you think of the boater hat?

Marco Taddei wearing our Boater hat.