Knitch Magazine

As the temperatures drop and the sunny days are few and far between, our attention turns to how we can stay warm yet in style at the same time. Doctors and scientists tell us how important it is to protect our heads and ears from the bitter cold and prevent loss of our body heat, but some of us find it challenging to find stylish hats and caps to accent our favorite winter coats and jackets. So we need to turn to haute-couture faves and design houses for advice and expand on our Fashion Outlook discussion of the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party.

As many of the preeminent knitwear designers so aptly show in their collections, stylish headgear comes in a wide range of shapes, sizes and designs. From the embroidered and appliquéd stylings of Barry Klein and Fayla Reiss to the romantic berets of Debbie Bliss and Norah Gaughan, you can select the right approach for your own personal fashion statement. And when you consider the dramatic difference between a Dickensian newsboy cap and a drapey, multi-purpose cowl, you can now switch off your headgear to reflect your mood and set the tone for each outfit you wear.

Of course, we know that a trend is really hot when we see it featured in the sewing world too, so when we saw the high-fashion styles recently available from Vogue, we knew everyone was joining “le chapeau” bandwagon. Then when we discovered that Simplicity had translated this high-fashion look to a series of sewing pattern designs that coordinate dog and owner headgear, well, we realized this trend had definitely gone mainstream America!