The Great Gatsby hats by Miller Hats

The famous Miller Great Gatsby Hat collection is inspired by the 2013 romantic drama film.  The film is based on the 1925 Novel The Great Gatsby by Scott Fitzgerald.  The novel is set in the Jazz Age on Long Island, near New York City, the novel depicts first person narrator Nick Carraway’s interactions with mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby and Gatsby’s obsession to reunite with his former lover Daisy Buchanan.    

The Great Gatsby film was set in the 1920’s era.  The characters all wore 1920’s fashion, the men wore tailcoat tuxedos and underneath a white wingtip collar shirt.  To match the tuxedos they wore a top hat, a bow tie, a walking stick or a pocket watch.  The trousers were high waisted and they wore double breasted vests with a single breasted jacket.   1920’s fashionable suits were worn with Boater Hats, derby hats and wide brim fedoras.   The most informal style of hat worn at the time was the newsboy flat cap.   

The main characters, Jay Gatsby(Leonardo DiCaprio), Nick Caraway (Tobey Maquire) and Tom Buchanan (Joel Edgerton)  wore boater hats with a variety of colorful patterns.  But many of the additional characters wore fedoras in straw or felt, newsboy caps and flat caps.  The relevance of the main characters wearing hats in the 1920’s is primarily due to the fact that hats were a must.   In that time and era - men did not leave the house without  wearing a head covering.   

Miller Hats Great Gatsby hat Collection includes top of the line genuine fur felt hats and a wool hat.  If you are getting ready to attend a Great Gastby theme party or if you need 1920’s men’s hats visit our online catalog or store front.  Many styles, colors and sizes available and ready to ship.

Miller Dress Hats - Homburg Hats, Derby Hats, Fedoras

Men’s Mayser Fedora hats

Leonhard Mayser opened a millinery shop in Sterngass Street in Ulm in the 1800s. Mayser soon makes a name for itself in the production of handmade men’s felt hats. The handmade fedora hat by Mayser shows an attractive modern touch of classical elegance.  

The Atos Fedora hat by Mayser comes with a classic Euro center dent crown, snap brim and a top of the line grosgrain ribbon to give the hat plenty of character. Mayser uses 100% genuine fur felt to make this classic fedora Hat. This top of the line fur felt material contributes to making this hat a high-quality fedora.  

The Euro Fedora Hats are handmade in Europe by Mayser hats and they come with satin liners. The collection is available in beautiful colors such as black, gray, brown, cognac and blue. The classic center dent fedora hat is very popular at Miller Hats, primarily because every color is available up to size 8. Hats for big heads are hard to find. However, the Mayser brand does a great job of making this hat fit well. The sizing of the hat is accurate to a 64 (European sizing) or size 8 (American). This is one of the few fedoras available in XXXL size. 

So, if you are serious about men’s fedora hats, Miller Hats is the place to go. Most items are in stock ready to ship!

Chaplin Derby Hats

Charlie Chaplin had a very philosophical, yet practical, view of clothing. Regarding the costuming of The Tramp, he said, “I had no idea what make-up to put on… However, on the way to the wardrobe, I thought I would dress in baggy pants, big shoes, a cane and a derby hat… I had no idea of the character. But the moment I was dressed, the clothes and the make-up made me feel the person he was. I began to know him, and by the time I walked on to the stage he was fully born… Gags and comedy ideas went racing through my mind.” 

Whether you’re showing off your own style or imitating a classic, like Charlie Chaplin, this Chaplin Hat is a classic. The Chaplin derby hat is available in black, gray and cognac. This derby hat has an open crown and a 2” rolled bound edge brim. Let’s not forget the 1 ¾" grosgrain bow band to top it off. This is a top-quality wool hat with a great price. Perfect to wear at any formal event, wedding, 1920’s party, Kentucky derby event, costume party, or a theater presentation. This hat is not only classic to men, but it’s also worn by many women.  If you are serious about getting a derby Chaplin Hat Miller hats is the place to go. 

Miller Fedora Hats

The Fedora is a hat with a soft material, a snap brim and indented crown.  We can shape Fedora hats in a variety of crowns, but the most typical ones being a “teardrop” or a “centerdent”. Crown heights will vary depending on the style anywhere between 4” and 4 ⅝”. Brims will run anywhere between 2 ½ to 3”. Fedora hats can have brims that have a raw edge, bound edge (trim around the edge), or underwelt or upper welt.  We can make Fedora hats of wool, cashmere, genuine fur felt, and beaver felt. The Miller Fedora hats come with satin liners, leather sweatbands, and top of the line grosgrain bands.    

The name Fedora originally came from a dramatic play written in 1882 by playwright Victorien Sardou. The play was first performed in the US in 1889. Bernhardt played Princess Fedora Romanov, the heroine of the play. In the play she wears a center dent soft brim hat. The hat was fashionable for women, and the women’s rights movement adopted it as a symbol. After Edward Prince of Wales wore them in the 1920s, it became popular among men for its stylishness and its ability to protect the wearer’s head from the wind and weather. 

By the 1920s fedoras got popular, it became a staple of men’s fashion and would be worn in public places. In the 1940s the fedora hats became a significant trend in America. Many films re-popularized the fedora hat in the 1940s, like Humphrey Bogart in the film Casablanca and many others. Movie stars, musicians, political figures would also make the classic fedora popular.    

They often associated fedoras with gangsters during the prohibition era in the U.S. during the 1920s and the early 1950s. In addition, well known gangsters such as Al Capone, Charles Luciano and Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel used the fedora to create a tough-guy image. Fedoras were also an important accessory to the Zoot suit ensemble during the 1940s. As a result, this style soon spread to local jazz and blues musicians, who adopted this look and brought it to their audiences.   

The fedora hats continued to be popular through to later films such as “The Blues Brothers” with John Belushi and Dan Akroyd and, of course, the most famous Fedora of all, Indiana Jones, in the “Raiders of the Lost Ark”. With the aid of the snap brim on most Fedoras, it served the practical purpose of hiding the face of actors sufficiently to allow doubles to perform the more dangerous stunts on the sets of action movies. However, it is the Film Industry of Hollywood that brought the Fedora to the forefront of fashion.

Remember you get the look you want at Miller Hats! 

Order your Fedora Hat TODAY, over 1000 styles to choose from. 

Bailey Wool Felt Hats

The Elite wool felts by Bailey Hats start with 16 micron sheep's wool, the finest available. They give this twice the carding action and wet felting to bring this luxury wool to life. No shellac is used to preserve the softness. A special brim and crown sanding is performed by skilled hat makers using proprietary processes to create and retain the world's finest feeling wool felt ever. Elite stiffened wool felts have an added 'hand cooked' shellac to provide a stiffness like hats were made when Bailey started in 1922.  This Elite Process applies to the Colver hat style and other fashionable wide brims in our collection.  

The Litefelt Bailey Hat is a revolutionary process that takes a natural unstiffened premium wool felt hat and treats it with a water repellent and shape retentive proprietary process. This makes the LiteFelt® hats one of the most popular styles this season.  This is a great combination of style and function.  This is our best selling finish and is only made in America.  The Litefelt hats include the Tino, The Blixen, and The Curtis and a few others in our collection. Many colors and sizes to choose from.

Order your Bailey Hat TODAY!

Top Hats by Miller

The classic flat top hat is without a doubt one of the most formal hats ever made. The fur felt top hat was popular at the end of the 19th Century. We also know top hats as Madhatter Hats, or Coachman hats. Mostly, top hats are made of Fur Felt and wool felt materials. Until World War I, the black fur felt was a standard item of formal outdoor wear by upper-class males for both daytime and evening usage. 

Miller hats carries the style 360 Madhatter Top hat in black wool felt with a 7” crown a 2” rolled brim bound edge, with a 1 ⅞” double bow grosgrain band. The classic top hat Miller Hats carries is the Black Wool Coachman hat, available in a 4 ½” Crown, 2” rolled brim and a traditional double bow grosgrain band; the feather is optional, but adds elegance to the high crown.

Along with traditional formal wear, the top hat continues to be the most formal hat worn on special occasions, including weddings, funerals, horse racing events, Kentucky derby parties, theatrical productions, and magician shows. Men’s top hats persisted in politics and international diplomacy for several years.  Top Hats were part of formal wear for U.S presidential inaugurations frequently.  

For elegance and formal wear there is no equal to the Top Hat. It has been one of the most enduring forms of headwear of our time, and in one form or another they have lasted for over two hundred years since the Civil War era.  It’s available and ready to ship.

Order your Tops Hat Today!

 

Homburg Hats by Miller Hats

The homburg hat was popular at the beginning of the 20th Century. It comes with a center crease crown and a rolled bound-edge trim, with a double bow grosgrain hat band.  Unlike the bowler or the top hat, the Homburg was not as firm, but it was a slightly stiffened soft fur felt hat to keep its shape.  Overall, it was an elegant felt hat that was not as formal as the derby hat. But they often wore it when strolling in town or in place of a boater hat.  

Until about 1914, the Homburg hat kept its position on the hat formality scale. The repp band on the brim was sometimes light grey, while the hat band was the same color or darker. Over time, the brim curl diminished, and the crown lost some height.  After WWI, the hat became darker; black homburg hats were the most popular color, especially in the 1950s.  

Former UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill wore the Homburg hat during World War II, they often saw him in London wearing a homburg with a black suit and with formal trousers.  

Dwight D. Eisenhower wore a dark grey homburg hat with a stroller suit for his inauguration on January 20, 1953.  Al Pacino made the homburg very famous by wearing it in the famous film The Godfather, for which reason the hat is often called a “Godfather”.  Many Jazz singers also wore the famous Homburg, musicians such as John Lee Hooker, Duke Ellington, and many preachers of the time.

Nowadays, the homburg hat is worn in many classic films and theatrical performances. They often wore a homburg hat in Kentucky derby events, Great Gatsby parties, or even vintage formal events.  

We carry Miller Hats Homburgs in rabbit fur.  The hat is available in black, brown, gray and it comes with a double bow grosgrain band.  We line them with the famous Miller Hats satin liners.

Although you rarely see them on the streets, there will probably always be a few distinguished men who appreciate the elegance of a good Homburg hat. If you are a hat wearer, chances are you already have a few fedora hats in your collection, so next time, instead of looking at a Trilby or a Pork Pie hat, put on a Homburg and see how it looks. I am certain you will look exceptional!

Order your Homburg Hat Today!

Miller Genuine Panama Hats

Miller Genuine Panamas Hats are “The king of all summer hats”, the panama has remained the leader of the Miller Hats line because of its unique combination of smart appearance, lightness, coolness and durability.  The Miller genuine panamas are all hand-woven of “toquilla” fiber and imported from Ecuador and South America.   

Actually, it is said that an Ecuadorian named Francisco Delgado made the first Panama hat woven in the year 1629.  Since then, the weaving of Panama bodies has remained substantially the same - performed by native families who pass their skills on down from generation to generation.  

The tough “toquilla fibers’’ come from the leaves of palm plants.  They wash the shreds before they are rolled and flattened into the form suitable for weaving.  When the shredded leaves are processed and the fibers are in the form desired for weaving, they are sorted and selected according to length, thickness and color.  The more uniform the fibers are for each body, the better the finished hat can be. The finest grade of fibers produces the highest quality hat, not only because fineness of fiber results in fine texture but also because a hat of fine fibers takes considerably more time and effort to weave than a hat of course fibers.  

Nowadays,  the Panama hat brings an elegant boost to any summer outfit. It adds a sense of proper style to those sunny days, providing not only protection from the sun’s rays, but also an additional something like a welcome eccentricity.  The new collections of panama hats are colorful and fashionable. Remember, you get the look you want at Miller Hats!  

Order your genuine Panama Straw Hat Today