I got this fur felt top hat even though it was not doing very well as a study hat. I found out several things that I will incorporate into my hat making. The best of all is just how the lining was made and most likely aded to the inside of the hat. I never would have disturbed a perfect vintage hat to find this kind of thing out.
Crown sides
Brim
With the lining removed the insides of the hat looks like cardboard. I might have expected felt as the outside of the hat is a fur felt. I can’t say that is is beaver but it could easily be another fur. I tapped the side and brim of the hat to sound both and the crown is cardboard for sure, not so sure of the brim.
This has the standard top hat shape and proportions. It has a bow on the persons left side.
The upper brim is covered with material not fur felt like the crown tip and the crown sides.
From the left side you can see the bow better. It has one loop on the left and two hemmed tails on the right. The center of the bow is one length of the same petersham but with one edge folded over 1/3 of the total width. Which breaks it into two halves one doubled and one single thickness.
You can see it closer in this photo.Also you can see where there are tack stitches thru the hat to hole it down tightly to the side of the hat.
From the inside of the hat you can see that they use one length of thread to hold down the bow and that the bow was sewn on before the lining was added.
This is the non bow side (person’s right side). And alas, the petersham on the edge of the brim has fallen apart. I would attempt to restore this hat to wearable if I could find some vintage fine ribbed petersham but the finer stuff is hard to find and the modern is much finer.
This is the hat from the back.
The lining was loose and easily removable there was no sweatband in remaining. To me this was to most interesting part of getting a look at this hat. The lining looks like a normal weave silk. The center of the lining crown tip was printed with a logo but with no makers name.
The under brim was covered with a petersham fabric.
The crown tip has some texture on both sides but down the middle it is smooth. The sides and the tip were not sewn together first then dropped into the cardboard shape because you can not see the seam.
Looking at the shape from the outside you cans that the crown tip was most likely glued to the cardboard and the sides (both the fabric and cardboard were whipped stitch to the covered tip.
The crown side slide was folded back and stitched down with a long running stitch near the upper edge. This would be under the sweatband if one was still there.
You can see how long the stitching was in this shot.
Also the tabs cut near the bottom edge where the crown tip was sewn. These help the cardboard shape to the curve.
This might be the best shot of the texture that looks like it is part of the weave if the crown tip but is a result of the fabric being glued to the cardboard which already had the texture,
All of the pieces of this hat have the number 59 written or stamped onto them. I think this is the size 59cm which would be 23.22 in. Most likely in the end a 7 3/8.
The lining sides are cut on bias and the center seam is sewn on the straight of grain ends so that the center back seam of the lining is on a diagonal. It was sewn with a fine machine stitch.
When back I place you can see that the lining edge does not come close to the top. There are remains of glue on the lining (that are still sticky) so I think the lining was slipped into the hat after the sweatband was added then the two glued together. This way the lining would not go all the way down to the tip as it is here.
