Revisiting the winter hat

(Apologies for my delay in postings of late…with winter holidays arrived I now have a few weeks’ reprieve from school-matters, which I intend to use to finish up some posts and projects for this site).

Last winter, as I reskinned my Swedish milsurp hat, I was left with a few quibbles. (I find it’s helpful to write down these thoughts for just this very reason, so that I know what needs tweaking should I decide to revisit the project down the road):

“Were I to undertake this project again, I would’ve done a few things differently:
-using a heavier khaki material–like the plentiful scraps I had leftover from my donut helmet (uncovered only after I had finished this project!)
-only using two layers of wool for the flaps, instead of three.
-better copying the shape of the curvy panels that are added to the flaps.
-making the rear ribbed panel shorter (to better match the original artwork), while extending the neck coverage and shortening up the flaps a bit.”

As the weather has been getting cooler, I’ve been having to wear my flap hat more often, and as I’ve also been integrating more and more Star Wars style into my daily wardrobe, I finally felt that the vaguely-close-enough-ness of my hat just wasn’t accurate (or hardcore) enough.
And so, after pondering on what would be involved, I decided to go ahead and tackle the Pfilbee Jhorn Hat, Mark II.

^ The look we’re going for^

(For those of you just joining us, please follow the two links above for my initial research and output.)

This time around, instead of trying to split the difference between a functional in-universe hat and something that could pass for Civilian 2018 Wear, I went all-in and just did my best to replicate the in-universe artifact.
There’s not much to be said for this project, as everything I would normally comment on or point out was addressed in my to-do list above! I know that I will likely go ahead and replace the rear ribbed panel with a shorter, wider one sometime soon, which will be easily accomplished (the current panel is the same as last time and just applied over the rear flap).
Honestly, my main complaint is that the heavier cotton twill material I used this time around doesn’t have any stretch to it, unlike the lighter weight 97% cotton/3% spandex I used the first time. This means that the crown doesn’t conform to my head as neatly as before, and although I used the same pattern as earlier, there is a little slack left in two spots at the top rear of my head. I suppose I could have cut my patterns on the bias to get some natural stretch out of the twill material, but that was not a consideration at the time I was cutting my pieces. An alternative I considered after the fact would be to do a little more research and copy the main body from an existing hat with the same construction, such as a WWII US Navy cold-weather deck hat.
Another detail I intended to include but skipped over was adding a line of reinforcing stitching on the curved crown seam, which seems suggested in the original concept art. As they say, third time pays for all, so perhaps next year’s Mark III hat will be perfect!

In all, I’m very, very pleased with the final result, which is self-supporting and really more of a soft helmet than a hat. Whether for a civilian, Rebel, or Imperial (Survey Corps) impression, this style of hat is a great way to integrate some legitimate Star Wars commoner’s style into your everyday wardrobe.

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