The Complete Handbook of Costume Hats

Costume hats are not ordinary headwear. They are engineered for appearance first, often using materials and construction methods that would never survive daily street wear. Felt that is shaped at high temperature, velour that sheds under stage lights, wire brims that bend out of true — these are not defects; they are inherent properties of the materials. This book teaches you to work with those properties instead of fighting them.

The first part of the handbook is a practical education in hat anatomy: the difference between blocked and sewn construction, how to identify fur felt from wool felt or synthetic blends, what the various types of buckram and millinery wire are actually good for, and how to read a hat maker's size tag without guessing. It explains why two hats with the same nominal size can fit completely differently, and how to measure a performer's head for a specific hat rather than a generic average.

The second half covers the day-to-day reality of owning and operating costume headwear: storing hats so they hold their shape, cleaning them without destroying the finish, repairing torn linings, re-blocking crushed crowns, and replacing sweatbands. There is also a substantial section on buying and selling — wholesale sourcing, private labeling, rental agreements, and the liability questions that every lender of used hats eventually runs into.