Cloche (Hats)

Deep enough to reach your eyebrows, a cloche is blocked into a bell that sits on the skull rather than perching on top of it. The brim is short, one to two inches, and turns down all the way around.

Crown depth is the working part. Because the hat grips several inches of your head instead of resting on the crown, it stays on in wind with no pin and no cord. That grip also removes every bit of tolerance from sizing, since felt and straw are blocked over a form and cannot be stretched afterward. A head measurement half an inch out is a hat you will not wear. Some carry a small gusset or an inner drawstring to take up a quarter inch, and that is the only adjustment on offer.

A fedora carries a creased crown and a snap brim and sits high, where this is smooth, uncreased and low, framing the face instead of topping it. A beret shares the low profile but has no brim and no grip beyond its band. A beanie covers the same amount of head yet stretches, which forgives sizing in a way this never will. Compared with a sun hat, the brim here is far too short to shade anything past your eyebrows.

Short hair or a low flat bun sits neatly under the deep crown, and coats with a defined collar balance the low brim line. If you want the eye drawn to your face, that downturned brim does it better than any other shape here. Thick hair has nowhere to go inside the crown, and the hat rides up until the fit is gone.

Try the depth before anything else. The band should meet your forehead about a finger's width above your eyebrows, and the hat should not rock when you shake your head. Press the crown: blocked felt holds firm and springs back, while a molded synthetic dents and stays dented. Store it stuffed with tissue or on a form so the bell does not flatten, and keep felt away from steam, which shrinks it further.