A sailor hat is a brimmed straw hat similar to those historically worn by nineteenth century sailors before the sailor cap became standard. It is very close in appearance to the masculine boater, [1] although "sailors" as worn by women and children have their own distinct design, typically flat-crowned, wide-brimmed and with a dark ribbon band extending into streamers hanging off the brim. [2] Such hats could also be made in felt as an alternative to straw. [3]
The sennit or straw hat formed part of the British naval uniform from 1857 up until March 16 1921 when it was formally discontinued by order. [4] [5] Sometimes worn with a black cover in bad weather or a khaki cover on active service ashore, the sennet hat usually included the ship's name on a tally band around the crown. [6]
The "sailor" was a standard form of fashionable headgear for women and children in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Children often wore it with sailor suits. [3] For women, the sailor became fashionable from the 1870s onwards, in a rather smaller form than its inspiration. [7] One 1870s variation on the style was the Marin anglais bonnet, which added extra trimmings of flowers and ribbons to the sailor hat form. [8] In most decades since the 1870s the sailor, or variations thereof, has been in fashion, or a staple form of headgear. One popular variation was the "short-back sailor", distinguished by its large broad flat brim, narrowing sharply (sometimes to nothing) in the back, and frequently worn at an upwards tilt. [9]
The sailor hat was a key part of Chanel's trademark 'little boy' look that she popularised in the 1920s and revived in 1954 for her comeback collection. [10] [11]
A cap is a flat headgear, usually with a visor. Caps have crowns that fit very close to the head. They made their first appearance as early as 3200 BC. Caps typically have a visor, or no brim at all. They are popular in casual and informal settings, and are seen in sports and fashion. They are typically designed for warmth, and often incorporate a visor to block sunlight from the eyes. They come in many shapes, sizes, and are of different brands. Baseball caps are one of the most common types of cap.
A boater is a semi-formal summer hat for men, which was popularised in the late 19th century and early 20th century.
Bonnet has been used as the name for a wide variety of headgear for both sexes—more often female—from the Middle Ages to the present. As with "hat" and "cap", it is impossible to generalize as to the styles for which the word has been used, but there is for both sexes a tendency to use the word for pop styles in soft material and lacking a brim, or at least one all the way round, rather than just at the front. Yet the term has also been used, for example, for steel helmets. This was from Scotland, where the term has long been especially popular.
1860s fashion in European and European-influenced countries is characterized by extremely full-skirted women's fashions relying on crinolines and hoops and the emergence of "alternative fashions" under the influence of the Artistic Dress movement.
1870s fashion in European and European-influenced clothing is characterized by a gradual return to a narrow silhouette after the full-skirted fashions of the 1850s and 1860s.
During the 1820s in European and European-influenced countries, fashionable women's clothing styles transitioned away from the classically influenced "Empire"/"Regency" styles of c. 1795–1820 and re-adopted elements that had been characteristic of most of the 18th century, such as full skirts and clearly visible corseting of the natural waist.
Fashion in the period 1900–1909 in the Western world continued the severe, long and elegant lines of the late 1890s. Tall, stiff collars characterize the period, as do women's broad hats and full "Gibson Girl" hairstyles. A new, columnar silhouette introduced by the couturiers of Paris late in the decade signaled the approaching abandonment of the corset as an indispensable garment.
A Dolly Varden, in this sense, is a woman's outfit fashionable from about 1869 to 1875 in Britain and the United States. It is named after a character in Charles Dickens, and the items of clothing referred to are usually a hat or dress.
A bergère hat is a flat-brimmed straw hat with a shallow crown, usually trimmed with ribbon and flowers. It could be worn in various ways with the brim folded back or turned up or down at whim. It is also sometimes called a milkmaid hat. It was widely worn in the mid-18th century, and versions may be seen in many British and French paintings of the period, such as The Swing by Fragonard, and in portraits by Thomas Gainsborough and Johann Zoffany, amongst others. It has been suggested that the hat was named after Madame Bergeret, who is holding a shepherdess-style hat in a Boucher portrait painted c.1766.
A jockey's cap is the headgear worn by a jockey in the sport of horse racing. The modern jockey's cap forms part of a jockey's "silks" or racing colours and is worn over a protective equestrian helmet.
Fashion in the twenty years between 1775 and 1795 in Western culture became simpler and less elaborate. These changes were a result of emerging modern ideals of selfhood, the declining fashionability of highly elaborate Rococo styles, and the widespread embrace of the rationalistic or "classical" ideals of Enlightenment philosophes.
A boudoir cap is a form of lingerie nightcap that was popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
A Breton is a woman's hat with a round crown and a deep brim that is turned upwards all the way round, exposing the face. Sometimes the hat has a domed crown. Typically it is worn tilted to the back of the head.
A halo hat is a millinery design in which the headgear acts as a circular frame for the face, creating a halo effect. The design is said to date back to the late 19th century, when it was known as the aureole hat; this name is sometimes still used. It may also be known as the angel hat or bambini – the latter said to derive from Italian for terracotta plaques depicting the infant Christ.
A mushroom hat is a millinery style in which the brim of the hat tilts downwards, resembling the shape of a mushroom. It is a style that first emerged in the 1870s and 1880s, when it was usually made of straw. It became fashionable again from around 1907 to the late 1920s; these versions featured a distinctly downturned brim although the size and shape of the crown varied according to prevailing fashions.
A peach basket hat is a millinery design that resembles an upturned country basket of the style typically used to collect fruit. Generally it is made of straw or similar material and it often has a trimming of flowers and ribbons. Some models may also feature a veil or draped fabric covering. It was introduced in around 1908 and caused some controversy over the succeeding year due to its extreme dimensions and decorations. It had revivals – designs were at this stage more modest – in the 1930s and 1950s.
The Salvation Army bonnet was a millinery design worn by female members of the Salvation Army. It was introduced in 1880 in the UK and was worn as headgear by most female officers in western countries. It began to be phased out from the late 1960s.
A bumper brim is a millinery feature in which the hat brim is tubular in design, making it a prominent feature of the hat. In order to achieve this effect, the brim may be rolled, stiffened or padded. A bumper brim can be added to a variety of hat designs, from small to large.
A coal scuttle bonnet is a design of bonnet with stiffened brim and a flat back (crown). The name originates from its similarity to the shape of a traditional coal storer. It may be very similar in design to the poke bonnet – some sources use the terms interchangeably – however the poke shape had a wide and rounded front brim that extended beyond the face, according to fashion historian Mary Brooks Picken, while the Metropolitan Museum of Art notes that the poke generally shielded the face and had a wide brim that provided a large surface for decoration.
The Chapeau à la Paméla, Pamela hat or Pamela bonnet described a type of straw hat or bonnet popular during the 1790s and into the first three quarters of the 19th century. It was named after the heroine of Samuel Richardson's 1741 novel Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded. While Pamela hats and bonnets underwent a variety of changes in shape and form, they were always made from straw. The mid-19th-century version of the Pamela hat was a smaller version of an early 19th-century wide-brimmed style called the gipsy hat.
As regards naval ratings, the most interesting change was the abolition of the sennet or straw hat, by an order dated March 16.