1) my P.O.V.
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i live in southern arizona and unlike thousands of other amazon hat reviewers, i don't care how a hat makes me look. i wear a hat so i won't die.
for my physiology, a hat has to have a large brim. it has to be a *light colour* and be vented to benefit from whatever breeze is available. while a cheap straw hat meets all of these requirements, they are not able to withstand a day in the desert, where your headgear will be used to beat aggressive flying insects, be snagged by a variety of thorns, and possibly tumble down a rockslide or get chewed on by a mountain lion if you have much sense of fun.
i think, why can't someone do this with hemp?
the brim on this is nowhere as near as wide as i would like, but after spending a few days finding *zero* hats that satisfy my four *simple* requirements, i bought this and a cov-ver safari and decided to see how they'd make out.
2) about the hat
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i'd imagine everyone who likes the look of this hat will be satisfied, since i only saw three reviews (all from arizonans!) who share my values. it looks like hats look. you can be someone who wears a hat when you wear this hat.
the visible hemp material is breathable and dense enough to stop your scalp from being burned. the crown is rather firmly supported by a nylon mesh i'm not a fan of synthetics but fair enough, it's rigid and spaced enough not to interfere with the ventilation.
both the "leather" (suede appearing) and the veige "velvet" trim on the hatband are synthetic, but, as i rarely pay attention to such things, i'm impressed by the progression of technology exhibited in the appearance and texture of these synthetics. haha.
as said most people, you'll love this hat. i have to kill it before i can love it. the brim has an insert made of substantial white felt or card. mine was a little crooked, which tells me whoever made my cov-ver hat was happier. the entire brim is a separate piece sewn onto the crown. the hatband is glued on with some kind of clear rubbery stuff that will never come off the hemp. i'm replacing that with a light coloured band of hemp fabric because i want to stay alive and i don't want to see glue when i look at my hat. i'd rather forego the band entirely of course.
yes, in arizona, you can tell the hell of difference between a black and a white hat. all you hat makers need to come here and find this out.
the felt/card also folds up to make a stiff band. maybe this is the way people make these hats, but for me, it's an oven waiting to happen, so that had to be trimmed down.
there is a cotton, maybe cotton/poly sweatband with some fluffy white stuff inside. all in all, there are *seven* layers of fabric around the band. can you see me, in 110 degrees, covered in sweat, holding this hat and explaining it to people who make hats. there are cactus and rocks and *no* shade. this heat is real.
i'm going to have to cut out the fuzz and trim the cotton band down to about a half inch, because i want this hat to rest on my head, not suck on it. then i'll have something worth wearing during the cooler parts of the year.
i don't know where you people live or what you want in your life, but i want to buy one hat and have it last for a good while. i want it to be a simple, strong, honest, functional construction based on experience. i know other people want a hat so they can buy something at the mall that will give their exploited commercialised existence something resembling the fabricated meaningfulness the media likes to encourage them to have, and won't mind wearing a heavy cardboard ring with silicon glue so they can portray that authentic hemp thing, because that seems to be the american way.
to survive as a practical person in the modern marketplace takes fortuity and perseverence. this hat is about halfway there it's fairly solid, it's light, will breathe alright, and i like that a lot. i can smack things with it and wear it the next day too. the production is pretty cheesy and maybe unconsiconable, but compared to a most of what you'll find, i'd say at about 20% evil i can knock down to 10%, it comes out ahead.
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