The hat I wear most when it’s cold is the PS Watch Cap – I have four and wear them constantly during the winter, given my lack of hair means I always need something on top.
But when it’s a little wet I also regularly wear a suede flat cap, because the peak provides better shelter for the face, and because the material is more robust than cashmere. I still occasionally wear a brimmed hat like my fedora from Optimo, but that’s a particular look for me, rather than an everyday one.
These suede caps I wear have popped up regularly on PS over the years – they were from Lock & Co, the Tremelo model. I wore it with the Bridge Coat when we first launched it, and also with the navy Donegal coat when we shot that in Oxford.
But a couple of years ago Lock stopped doing the Tremelo in my favourite dark-brown suede, and so I thought it was a good opportunity to do what we’ve so often done over the years – become a retailer of the product ourselves in order to make it available again.
This is the new hat we’re putting on the shop today. It’s the same model, style and sizing as Lock’s Tremelo, just in the most versatile material for me – a really dark-brown suede.
Why do I find it versatile? Because tweed versions are a little harder to wear – they come with more baggage, whether it’s Last of the Summer Wine or Peaky Blinders. I have a nice one in Fox charcoal wool – probably the easiest tweed one to wear – and it’s still not straightforward. Suede is more deliberate, a conscious choice away from that traditional workman’s staple.
Tweed also absorbs rain more and can get a little soggy, so I find suede better. To be clear, I’m not wearing the suede when it’s raining hard, as I could wear a good fedora; it’s usually when there’s the threat of rain, or perhaps I have an umbrella too: in the same way as I’d wear a water-resistant coat.
Style wise, my favourite thing to wear the cap with is a tailored overcoat, as shown above. This is my double-breasted overcoat from B&Tailor, and I think the cap looks particular sharp with tailored coats like this – like it’s sheltering the face in the same way the collar is sheltering the neck.
I wear the cap with my tweed Liverano coat too, but not really with a tweed jacket. Below are a few images of me wearing my caps over the years, so you can see them with different coats. The tobacco suede is also cool, but I find the brown more versatile so we decided to offer that colour first.
The other thing I like about flat caps is that they can have a very different style depending on how they’re worn, so I asked photographer Milad Abedi to take a few shots in the way he would wear his (below).
He’s gone for a coat in the same way as me, but a more relaxed, slightly oversized raglan, and more significantly, likes wearing it backwards as well as forwards.
Something Milad and I both have in common, of course, is that we both have beards. But I think a flat cap is quite versatile with different face and head shapes – like most hats it’s just a question of proportions, whether bearded or not.
The caps come in four sizes: 56, 58, 60 and 62cm, roughly equivalent to a small, medium, large and extra large. In inches that’s 6⅞, 7⅛, 7⅜ and 7⅝. The peak is six inches.
I have a pretty large head and wear a size 60, a large. In brimmed hats I’m usually a 59 or 60, and in other hats that are sized I’d usually be a large. Milad is the same. The caps do stretch a little bit over time if they need to, I’d say by at least a centimetre – but only if they are tight and have to.
The cap is meant to sit halfway down the back of the head, and the peak be just above the level of the eyebrows at the front. But just like a felt hat, there is a fair amount of style in how you wear it – flat brimmed or more curved, level or at an angle. Personally I like a lot of curve (like my baseball caps) but set level. Milad prefers more of an angle.
In terms of care, the suede doesn’t necessarily need a waterproofing spray, but if you’re likely to wear it in the rain a lot, it is a good idea.
Like all suede, it benefits from being brushed occasionally, to remove dirt and bring up the nap. That’s particularly beneficial when the hat has been rained on. When wet, don’t place the cap on a radiator or another heat source, as that could make it shrink. If the hat does shrink, a hat jack is effective at stretching it.
The suede cap is available now on the PS Shop. If anyone has any questions – on this cap or on caps in general, please do let me know.
Below, some more old shots of me in mine. Happy to link to any of those articles if people would like.
