like a hand sewn in sweatband. For many reasons. You never get a pull into the hat body like you do with a human hand. You can't angle the stitch with a sewing machine.
An example. I sent Lee K. a CS AB. You want to know the first question he asked me? How did I get the brim to do what the Raiders brim does, on the CS hat? He was talking about the way the crown and brim transition at the brim break point. His very fine eye picked up something going on with this part of the hat. That you don't see on factory hats, or hats that have a machine sewed in sweat. The answer is, it's the way we sew our sweats in. Like John says above in the quote. And by sewing them in like this, you impart a look to the hat that is very Raiders like, and this cannot be replicated without sewing them in the way we do. A machine, or the machine used to sew in sweats does this totally differently. And therein is the difference. If not for this very fact, I would buy the machine and do mine with it. Because at the end of the day, if really does not matter how you sew in a sweat, UNLESS, you are replicating a particular hat, which in this case would be a Raiders, or CS as both share that one oddity. And if you want that on an Indy hat, you better hand sew the sweat in. Here I am giving away my secrets!!! I have never ever told this here prior, and its one of my tricks that LLS and John both use today.
Regarding Art, a friend by the way. Art looks to be using the Optimo model, which is a very smart thing to do. Art has always been up front on how he makes his hats, even with the poucing machine that he was lucky enough to find and buy. I well recall a disagreement between he and one other infamous hatter whom will go unnamed. But the oldies here know who. It was about Art using the pouncer. Art had said he did not see the big deal, about it, as it was much faster than hand pouncing, and he was right! You certainly don't get an inferiour finish by using one of these things, and it is a time saver. All those vintage hats we own were pounced with one of these. And they do a great job. And you can change out grits to get a finer finish, so there is no big deal here. Hand pouncing is so slow!! But, it was the way small shops did it in the old days, and that is what I am, and John, and every other hatter here. We are the small neighborhood hat shop of yesteryear, where the hats that were made, were basically hand crafted, but used a felt body made by a machine. So, the hat was blocked and assembled by hand, using hand tools. A true handmade hat is what existed prior to felting machines being invented, where the hatter actually handmade the felt cone, in shop. After its invention, "handmade" changed in definition.
So what we have today, with some very smart hatters, is a move to mass production equipment in what used to be called the front shop. The old Stetson company had the traditional back shop, that made the felt bodies, and a front shop that took these raw bodies and turned them into hats. Some companies of that era,big brands, just had the front shop, and outsourced their raw bodies from others. The front shop was as mechanized as much as possilbe to mass produce the hats. And these were large operations. At the same time, you still had the small hat shops, that could not afford this equipement, and really did not need it, as the volume was low, compared to the big boys. And they carried on the tradition of making hats in this manner. The western market kept this craft alive, until folks like us arrived on the scene. Because, the western hat never went totally out of style, due to regional differences in hat wearing.
So to move back, we have hatters today that basically are doing what the old front shops used to do, with certain big name brands of hats. Optimo is the prime example, and is able to generate alot of hats in a years time. He is limited, only by the number of orders he gets. He is not limited by what he can actually make. I would bet he could make more than he sells, if needed. And, Art and Graham go way back, and I think Art probably used the Optimo model when he got into hatting full time. Which was a very astute and smart thing to do. I doubt Art has anyone to finish his blocked hats out for him though. He still does it all himself, so you get a hat made by one guy. And, for those who have seen Art's work, it is exemplar, and something to be proud of. Art probably thinksI am nuts for doing it the way I do it. And he would be right. My defense is its just my peculiar personality, to do it the way I do. I am attracted to the small shop model, although my volume in the past really prohibited my model. But won't do so in the future, now that I finally understand how this works.
One thing to remember is back when Stetson was Stetson, in their front shop they had mass production equipment to make a fast made hat, but in the front shop they also had a group of master hatters. For special hats. These master hatters made their hats by hand. Took their time. And these hats ended up on film stars of the era, who Stetson gave hats to, for advertisement, and also for special dignataries and folks of that nature. But, you don't see these on ebay much. These hand made hats.
I think I fit into this category, along with others here. We are like the old master hatters that worked for Stetson. Not that any of us are master hatters, whatever that means today. But we serve their purpose, and place in the world of hatmaking. But by doing so, we will never be in the income class of folks like Optimo. But I don't think any of use actually started making hats for the money anyways. I know I didn't. If money was the reason, I would certainly be doing the Optimo business model. And if lucky, I could be taking those trips to Ecuador to peruse the newest offering from the Montecristi weavers, and smoke Cubans while doing so.
This is still a hobby for me, mentally. I have no dreams of it being anything else but that. But if I were 20 something again? That might be a totally different story, and I would have cashed in my investments and bought a full blown mass production shop and entered into the big money fray of hatting. Because, if you got the customers, and can deliver in a timely manner, there is alot of money to be made in hatting, especially when you fetch 4 to 5 hundred bucks for a factory made hat like some of these guys do. My two cents. Fedora
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-M
