Hat Care

By: James Lilliefors, author of Ball Cap Nation

Tips on how to clean your baseball cap.

From Saturday Night Hat

Quick, Easy Hatmaking for the Downtown Girl by Eugenia Kim with technical writing By Joanne Paek. Potter Craft, The Crown Publishing Group, Random House 2006

Your hat will give back to you what you give to it, so take good care of your special chapeau!

By Judy Gordon

HOW TO CARE FOR YOUR HATS

Hats are like anything else in life; if you want them to look good, you'll have to care for them. Here are some tips.

When dealing with vintage hats, purists never wear them, less strict collectors wear them when their hair is very clean, and nobody takes the aging hat out in a downpour. Stiff hats will collapse.

From How to Clean Everything by Alma Chesnut Moore

Keep them well brushed and they will be damaged less if caught in the rain. To clean them, wipe with a cloth dipped in warm suds, made with a synthetic detergent or soap. Rinse with a cloth wrung out of plain water. Do not get a straw hat too wet or it may shrink.

Proper handling will extend the life of your hat. Never touch the hat with dirty, oily hands or gloves. There is no quicker way to ruin your hat. Pick up the hat from underneath by both the front and back brim to maintain the shape and set of the brim. Resting a hat when not on your head on a hat stand or block will make this operation easier.

We get inquiries like the one below all the time. We thought it would be useful to reprint one of our responses in this HAT CARE section:

Good Morning Fred, This email has absolutely nothing to do with the hat that I ordered from you,......(Click for the story).

This video teaches you the proper method for cleaning your felt hats using a hat brush.

Periodically, felt hats can become misshapen. In order to get your felt hat back up to snuff, you can use the wonderful power of steam!