BROOKLYN HAT COMPANY IS OUT TO MAKE HATS COOL AGAIN
Founded in a small studio in Williamsburg, NY, Brooklyn Hat Company is on a mission to invigorate the art of millinery by delivering diverse styles to the marketplace. After an initial test launch of ball caps with “California Love” and “Brooklyn” logos, the line quickly grew to include fedoras, utilitarian safari hats and western styles. Now, with a collection that offers over 50 styles that retail between $40 and $100, the company is “bringing sexy back” to a category that is lacking a younger and edgy niche, says Ben De Luca, brand manager and designer for Brooklyn Hat Company and VP of corporate sales Dorfman Pacific luxury division.
“We’re going after the cool kids,” De Luca told MR. “Whether they’re 18 or 65, it’s just how you feel on the inside. You’re as young as you feel. People will talk to you more when you have on a hat; it’s a conversation starter.”
De Luca took his inspiration from cities around the world such as Austin, Nashville, Tokyo (and Brooklyn), where hats are making a huge resurgence. Consumers there, says De Luca, are looking for quality headwear with details such as feather and porcupine quills that really make their hats stand out, as well as looking more into vintage shops and trying to re-create hats that harken back to the 1950s and 1960s.
“We want to be the top of the mark for hats,” said De Luca. “We make sure to listen to our customers and we respond to them by being innovative and evolving to meet their needs. We’ve been going to events and seeing what people are wearing. It’s also important that we take inspiration from the classics as well, like James Dean and Marilyn Monroe, with the aim of romanticizing the hat business once again.”
So what’s next for the brand? “We are going to focus on some made in America styles,” mentions De Luca. “We’re partnering with a manufacturer in Texas to make these new styles come to life.”
MR Magazine Brooklyn Hat Co