Project Cubbins: Hat Fifty-Five

Day Fifty-Five / Hat Fifty-Five: Red, white and blue "Uncle Sam" style top hat. Note matching hat worn by my shoulder trout Gilly. I made Gilly's hat myself several Fourth of Julys ago from an Independence Day themed cocktail napkin. Gilly also has a pair of stylin' earmuffs (gillmuffs?) for the winter season.

Project Cubbins: Hat Fifty-Four

Day Fifty-Four / Hat Fifty-Four: Beige corduroy cap with embroidered Orvis logo altered to read: "L.L. Orvis." Another hat from the Douglas A. Tschorn collection, and a gift (in its altered state) to him from a long-ago Orvis employee playing on the similarity/differences between the locally based Orvis Company and L.L. Bean of Freeport, Maine.

I managed to infiltrate the Wayside Country Store and take this shot before anyone knew I was even there. So let this be a lesson: lock up your hats lest they become blog fodder.

RELATED:

PC 53: Feather in my Cap
PC 47: Winnin' the Lottery
PC 38: Throw Your Tails in the Air

Project Cubbins: Hat Fifty-Three

Day Fifty-Three / Hat Fifty-Three: Vintage pink felt lady's hat with pink feather and jewel flourish. Tag inside reads: "Evelyn Varon model" with size tag that reads: "22."

This hat is the first of promising collection of vintage women's hats owned by my sister-in-law (the wife's sister not the brother's wife) and housed at the All Pine long-term storage quarters. A quick web search reveals that Evelyn Varon was a French milliner of some renown (comments to this post at Collecters Weekly indicate she designed costumes for the 1922 Broadway Play "Pins and Needles.")

RELATED: 
PC 52: Tschorn in a Tricorne
PC 24: Croc Top Cookin'
PC 13: A Boar-a and a Fedora

Project Cubbins: Hat Fifty-Two

Me sporting a tricorne (left), property of  nephew Preston McClary (right).

Day Fifty-Two / Hat Fifty-Two: Revolutionary War style black felt tricorne with metal snaps. Loaned from the personal collection of nephew Preston Douglas McClary (pictured above right) on the occasion of his 17th birthday.

According to Preston, he acquired the hat at the end of his seventh-grade year (he's about to enter his junior year this fall) which included a unit on Revolutionary War history. Preston expressed his interest in the hat to his teacher who, at the end of the academic year, traded him his own tricorne for a jar of Preston's artisanal wildflower honey. (Is this kid related to me or what?)

Preston brought the hat south from Burlington  as I headed north from Manchester and we met at Fort Ticonderoga, New York, (slogans include: "Two wars, five battles, one fort," and "America's Fort,.") where we and his mom (sister Sue) spent the day checking out the fort, which happens to be one of my favorite historical sites.

ALSO:
PC 51: Baby Goes Babushka
PC 47: Spencer Picks the Day's Lid
PC 14: I, I, I Want to be a Lifeguard

Project Cubbins: Hat Fifty-One

Day Fifty-One / Hat Fifty-One: 100% polyester blue bandana print Buff brand multifunctional headwear. If this conjures memories of the pink paisley do-rag from entry 41 and has you crying "duplicative," I will point out to you that this isn't the same animal -- in fact, according to the packaging it's twelve different animals -- as in it can be worn 12 different ways. By way of illustration, the photo on the right is alternative #4 (hood).

 The Bride seems to like this one (in alternative #7 "do-rag" mode), sometimes saying it gives me a Bruce Weber vibe (the famed photographer often wears one), other times saying it makes her think that's the way I looked back in my UVM days.



ALSO:
PC 8: Captain Kangol Who?
PC 22: A Head for (Freeway) Numbers
PC 28: Antlers Up!

Project Cubbins: Hat Fifty

Hat 50 (left) with interior detail (right).

Day Fifty / Hat Fifty: In honor of the first (albeit very tiny) milestone of fifty hats -- one tenth of the way to the big 500 -- I've chosen a very, very special hat. It's a brown 4X beaver felt ten-gallon cowboy hat with multi-color Native American influenced woven hatband, interior tag reads "John B. Stetson Company" and size tag reads "7 1/4." Inside the crown is a multicolored silk depiction of a cowboy giving his horse a drink of water from his own cowboy hat.

This hat was gift to me many years ago -- I'm going to say close to forty years ago -- by my Uncle John Schweitzer. He also bought a matching one for my older brother Allan. There are random photos of us with these huge genuine cowboy hats over the years, but they always seemed too big for our still-growing heads.

My sainted mother, wanting to make sure the hat and I stayed together, handed it off to me with great solemnity last year during a reclamation of former childhood bedroom space. It has been sitting here in the Vermont closet ever since, never quite having made the trip back to L.A.

A funny thing happened when I pulled it out of the closet and dusted it off for this Project entry a few minutes ago: I tipped it up onto my head, expecting, as always, to be swimming in it, and -- for the very first time in my entire life -- that forty-year-old cowboy hat fit absolutely perfectly.

Sometimes you grow up.

And sometimes you grow into your own hat.

Fifty down and four hundred and fifty left to go.

ALSO:
PC 49: Millinery Lite
Tip your ten-gallon to National Hat Day
Hats off to the Stetson X Swanepoel collection

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-Nine

Day Forty-Nine / Hat Forty-Nine: 100% cardboard Miller Lite 12-pack box.

Before anyone gets their hat hackles up (see the Facebook comments regarding my pink Tommy Hilfiger do-rag), note that the Project has always been about hats and headgear of all sorts. And when you're looking down the barrel of 500 chapeaux, you don't just need to end creatively, you need to start creatively too.

Also, anyone who knew me back in my college days knows this was one of my standard party tricks.

ALSO:
PC 48: Caddyshacker
PC 42: Hammock Time
PC 10: Garlic Garb

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-Eight

Day Forty-Eight / Hat Forty-Eight: 100% cotton patchwork madras driving cap from Orvis and purchased today at the Manchester, VT, flagship store. 

Bride and sister-in-law both approve, but just noted that thanks to the rest of my outfit - a pink Lacoste and weathered green Old Navy cargo shorts - I'm kind of rocking a golf caddy look.

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-Seven

Day Forty-Seven / Hat Forty-Seven: Gray baseball-style cap with multi-color embroidery that reads: "Vermont Mega Millions with Megaplier" and logo. The first (but probably not the last) hat from the DougTschorn series. Much of the collection can be seen in the center photo above, hanging in a place of honor beside his desk at the Wayside Country Store.

The aforementioned Doug is my father, so you can see the collecting of headgear is something that runs in the family. Speaking of running in the family, that's my sainted mother, Nancy, in the far right photo. L.A. folks might remember her as "the reindeer's mother" from Heather's holiday part of a few years back.

As for the provenance of the hat, dad tells me it was given to him by the "the Vermont Lottery Commission guy" and "about a year ago."

Why was this hat chosen? My godson nephew Spencer said: "That one." And the godfather delivered.

ALSO:

PC 46: Senioritis

PC 18: Vermont on my Mind

Real Vermonters according to the L.A. Times (in 1985)

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-Six

Day Forty-Six / Hat Forty-Six: Senior Moments bucket hat in forest green, loaned to Project Cubbins by the good doctor.

While I don't yet suffer from said "senior moments," getting up at this time of day makes me feel like I do.

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-Five

Day Forty-Five / Hat Forty-Five: Pink felt Happy birthday four-candle headband with interior label that reads "The Great PretendEars, Hanover Accessories Inc."

Worn in observance of the Bride's birthday.

From the beginning of Project Cubbins she's been saying: "You should do theme hats for certain days," and things of that nature. While I don't have much of a head for scheduling, planning and logistics, I do have a head for cake, so this entry has been on deck since Day One / Hat One.

ALSO:
PC 44: The Deere, John Letter
PC 37: Shirley, You Jester
PC 3: A Dash of (Beard) & 'Stache Panache

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-Four

Day Forty-Four / Hat Forty-Four: Green 100% cotton baseball-style cap with yellow and green embroidered John Deere logo and name (on front) and the slogan: "Nothing Runs Like a Deere" in yellow embroidery on the back. Another hat in the fruitful NC series.

The John Deere company make a lot of hay with its roots in the Midwest as evidenced by this timeline entry at its website: "1837 John Deere fashions a polished-steel plow in his Grand Detour, Illinois, blacksmith shop that lets pioneer farmers cut clean furrows through sticky Midwest prairie soil."

But any good Vermonter (a goodly number of transplants) know that inventor John Deere was not only born in the Green Mountain State (in Rutland in 1804), but learned the blacksmith trade in Middlebury "as an apprentice in the shop of Capt. Benjamin Lawrence from 1821 to 1825," as the Vermont Board of Historic Sites marker currently in place puts it.

As the marker also states: "In 1836 Deere removed to Grand Detour, Illinois where, in 1837, he built the world's first steel moldboard plow."

Anyone who had tended the rock garden that is Vermont's unforgiving soil will probably agree that while "the Plow That Broke the Plains" may have been invented in Illinois, the seeds for it were almost certainly sown back in Vermont.

Just sayin'.

ALSO:
PC 43: Yodel hey, he who?
PC 32: Picture Perfect Potter
PC 4: Loaded for Bear

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty Three

Day Forty-Three / Hat Forty-Three: Red felt hat, with forest green twisted cord hatband and gamsbart pin from the NC series. Interior sticker reads: "Made in Germany."

By my reckoning this is the second German hat of the project and, so far, the one that hews most closely to that Bartholomew Cubbins himself wore (though I'm hoping to get my hands -- and head -- on an exact replica before this is all over).

ALSO:
PC 42: A Head for Flowers
PC 2: Alpine Hobo Headgear
Fancy a Hat Beard for that Buttonhole?

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-Two

Day Forty-Two / Hat Forty-Two: Floral print baseball-style cap with leather Toms logo appliqué and metal grommet details. From the Bride's personal collection.

FYI, today's post comes from the hammock in the back yard. If you look close enough, you can see the reflection of the house in my sunglasses, as well as the trunk of Steve, our palm tree.

ALSO:
Toms Shoes: A Venice Shoe-in
Book Review: 'Start Something That Matters'
Toms Shoes' model is sell a pair, give a pair away

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty-One

Day Forty-One / Hat Forty-One: 100% cotton, made in China pink paisley Tommy Hilfiger bandana with
"Casual Friday" embroidered in lower right corner and held in place by a red, white and blue terrycloth sweatband.

The bandana's use as what's colloquially referred to as a "do-rag" was inspired by Peter Stigter, one of the photographers I got to know while covering the men's European runway shows, and who was rarely seen (in the summer months anyway) without something similar atop his head. (There's a good shot of him in just such a do-rag at his website here.)

Did you know that etymologically, it's the colors and spots that make it a bandana (also frequently spelled "bandanna")? That's what the Online Etymology Dictionary says anyway: "from Hindi bandhnu, a method of dyeing, from Sanskrit badhnati "binds" (because the cloth is tied like modern tie-dye)."

This particular bandana came from the 2011 Tommy Hilfiger Prep World pop-up at the Grove.That it perfectly matches my hat number index card is coincidence.

Or is it?

ALSO:
PC 40: Not the Last Straw
PC 4: A bear - in Spirit
Tommy Hilfiger hosts star-studded Prep World pop-up party

Project Cubbins: Hat Forty

Day Forty / Hat Forty: Multi-colored woven sun hat with pink straw band. Interior tags read "100% straw Made in Italy," and "Daniele Meucci, Florence, Italy." Borrowed from the Bride's collection.

Of its provenance she says: "I think that was Loehmann's purchase -- you can always find a good sun hat at Loehmann's."

Without carbon dating, the best guess is it's been part of her headgear collection for about seven years.


ALSO:
PC 39: Top hat, America!
PC 16: A Mickey Mouse Operation
PC 14: Surf's Up Brother Grimm

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Nine

Day Thirty-Nine / Hat Thirty-Nine: Red, white and blue felt top hat style headband with label that reads: "The Great PretendEars, Hanover Accessories Inc."

Happy Birthday America!

ALSO:
PC 38:  A Head for Tails
PC 23: St. Elmer's Headgear
PC 19: Panama, That

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Eight

Day Thirty-Eight / Hat Thirty-Eight : 100% cotton, khaki-colored baseball-style cap with cat silhouette
embroidery in black above embroidered slogan that reads: "Throw your tails in the air." Additional orange embroidery on the back of the hat reads: "ASPCA we are their voice."

This hat was a gift from my father-in-law (otherwise known as "the Admiral"). Make of that what you will  -- the tail-throwing and all -- but rest assured that the mental image you immediately conjured up of me in full feline downward dog (which, I apologize, you will most likely now carry with you forever) is more than offset by knowing there are many a cat and cat shelter whose lives have been bettered thanks to the Admiral's beneficence.

I just went to the ASPCA's website to see if this particular hat was still available. While it is not, I did find this one that would certainly be an appropriate candidate for Project Cubbins at some point down the line.

Your move, Admiral.

ALSO:
PC 37: Corporate jester
PC 36: You the dog now, man!
PC 34: Turban Frau Boy

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Seven

Day Thirty-Seven / Hat Thirty-Seven: Green color-blocked felt tri-tipped jester's cap with white puffball tips, courtesy of the NC series.

This would be the perfect hat for the imaginary job I think I'd be good at: corporate jester. Just imagine me pulling up a seat at a company's board meeting in a suit and tie and this lid.

You get the picture.

ALSO:
PC 36: Walkin' the mawg
PC 24: Gator crashing / crocking the croc
PC 17: His fez looks familiar

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Six

Day Thirty-Six / Hat Thirty-Six: Ewok cap with ears from the NC Series. This happens to be the most hair that's been on my head in years.

I had a vague feeling of déjà vu when  I saw what I looked like rocking this lid, and then it hit me: I felt a little like the late, great John Candy playing the half-man / half-dawg (make that "mawg") named Barf in Mel Brooks' sci-fi parody "Spaceballs."

ALSO:

PC 35: Shoe Soup
PC 16: A Mickey Mouse Operation
PC 2: Tyrolean Vagabondage

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Five

Day Thirty-Five / Hat Thirty-Five: Andy Warhol by Philip Treacy London 100% cotton bucket hat with multi-color shoe print exterior, allover Campbell soup can (beef noodle) print lining (above right. Another hat from the Bride series (the first one -- a Carmen Miranda fruit bowl turban posted yesterday - proved to be quite a hit with Riff readers), which she says she remembers purchasing when she was visiting her parents who were living in London at the time.

The Bride has come in to possession of a few things emblazoned with Warhol's shoe imagery over the years, including a closet room rug and a framed poster of a pink shoe with the words: "The autobiography of Alice B. Shoe," a gift from yours truly.

ALSO:
PC Hat 33: The chicken hat
PC Hat 32: Grace Potter head
PC Hat 30: Hey Boo Boo, let's go cubbin'!

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Four

Day Thirty-Four / Hat Thirty-Four: Carmen Miranda fruit bowl turban from the Bride's closet - originally purchased for a Halloween costume in which she was the woman from the Chiquita banana logo and I was a plus size banana.

The Whiteboard Chronicles "Even More Silly Band Names" Edition

Yeah you know you missed "Silly Band Names." Oh, and I hear Jasper Long Johns is opening for Digital Fist at the Troubadour this weekend.

If we're really lucky we'll catch and upcoming double bill of Sane Clown Posse Wendi Deng & the Prenups.

ALSO:
The Whiteboard Chronicles: "Where We're Going" Edition
The Whiteboard Chronicles: "More Funny Band Names"
The Whiteboard Chronicles: "Mythical Fonts" Edition

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Three

Day Thirty-Three / Hat Thirty-Three: Mixed fabrication chicken hat with interior tag that reads: "31st Street NC series, Carter tells me this is the "official chicken hat of Oktoberfest."
Clothing Co. Newport Beach, CA."  Another plucky pick from the

"It's seen plenty of chicken dancing and drinking but it doesn't remember much else," she says.

And if you think she's joking about the use of poultry hats to celebrate Oktoberfest, then you probably haven't been to ChickenHat.com. It may be egg-zactly what you need on Friday.

ALSO:
Of turducken and turkey hats
Project Cubbins: Hat Seventeen
Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Three

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-Two

Hat Thirty-Two (left), Grace Potter and me (right) at the Shrine Auditorium June 26, 2013.

Day Thirty-Two / Hat Thirty-Two: Forest Green trucker-style cap with white embroidered owl and moon
logo surrounded by the words: "Grace Potter and the Nocturnals."

This is such a fresh addition to the headgear archives it's still warm. It was purchased less than 12 hours ago after the bride and I caught GPN opening for Robert Plant and the Sensational Shape Shifters at the Shrine Auditorium.

Between acts I even had a chance to pop back to the tour bus and chat briefly with fellow Vermonter Grace Potter (whom I'd once interviewed for a Coachella-related style story), who turned out to be as charming in person as she was on the phone.

Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-One
Coachella musicians hip to fashion
Grace Potter takes Diane von Furstenberg on tour - kind of

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty-One

Day Thirty-One / Hat Thirty-One: Khaki-colored 100% cotton baseball-style cap with multi-color  embroidery that reads: "TCM Classic Film Festival."

This hat came into my possession in 2012, after the Bride was part of  Bloomingdale's / TCM Film Festival event  called: Style in the Movies: A Celebration of Costume Design with Deborah Nadoolman Landis. Every time I wear it I feel like I should step out into a well-appointed living room and do my best Robert Osborne impression.

ALSO:
Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty
2012 TCM Classic Film Festival Kicks off with 'Cabaret,' Liza Minelli
Headwear Association to handout free hats at Eagle Rock Farmers Market 6/28

Project Cubbins: Hat Thirty

Day Thirty / Hat Thirty: Knit bear cub cap, 100% wool exterior, polyester interior, courtesy of the ever-bountiful Noelle Carter Headgear Archive.

I dedicate today's hat to my niece and goddaughter Alizabeth, affectionately known around the family as "Ali Bear," who turns 21 years old today. Although she's now reached the age where any potential godfatherly duties are less legal responsibility and more opportunity to do Marlon Brando impressions at family functions, I'll always feel a certain responsibility for -- and renegade kinship with -- my brother's youngest cub.

Related:

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Nine

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Eight

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Seven

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Nine

Day Twenty-Nine / Hat Twenty-Nine: Black Polar fleece cap with assorted-size polka dots and ears lined in tufts of pink shag. Another hat in the prolific NC series, this one appears to have been slightly modified from its original shape as indicated by a slightly unfinished edge.

I chose this hat not only because it seemed an appropriate way to jump start an overcast Monday morning, but also because I think it is the perfect accessory to my new brightly striped Brooks Bros. button-down shirt.

Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Eight
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Seven
Clothing makers expand recycling efforts

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Eight

Day Twenty-Eight / Hat Twenty-Eight: Black trucker-style, mesh-back cap with orange contrast stitching and orange embroidered Jägermeister stag's head logo appliqué and name on right front panel.

If I recall correctly, this hat came into my possession on Saint Patrick's Day 2012 whilst in a bar in Palm Springs with my wife and our friend Erin Weinger. But, as with most things involving Jägermeister  the details are a bit hazy.

Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Seven
Fancy a hat beard for that buttonhole?
Oh Deer God: the real story behind the Jägermeister label

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Seven

Day Twenty-Seven / Hat Twenty-Seven: Overly embellished Christian Audigier trucker-style cap with
mustard yellow mesh back, turquoise front and bill with allover gold embroidered CA monograms topped with crowns as well as one large appliqued patch of same in the front center of the hat.

Additional details include a chunky gold button (also with crown detail) on top of the hat and the words  "CHRISTIAN AUDIGIER EST. 1958 LOS ANGELES" in gold embroidery on the reverse side of the bill also with crown detail.

I'll just let this hat speak (loudly) for itself.

Related:
Oh, to be indelible
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Six
Ed Hardly? Chrstian Audgier to debut new flash-free fashion

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Six

Day Twenty-Six / Hat Twenty-Six: Black newsboy-style cap with white stripes and snap that secures front
of hat to brim. White embroidery in front reads" "K Paul's Louisiana Kitchen." This rarity from the NC series has a cool back story.

Noelle (in case you missed the beginning of the NC series, there are all hats loaned to Project Cubbins by bacon- and hat-loving co-worker, chef and test kitchen director Noelle Carter) says this hat was one of two issued to her when she started working for Chef Paul Prudhomme in New Orleans about a decade ago.

Adam and randos at the
 Funky Pirate in New Orleans

"Everybody was issued two of these hats when they started working there," she told me, "and you got to keep one when you left."

Her keepsake kitchen cap from her days in the Big Easy is the one pictured here.

"It probably still has the smell of fry oil on it," she says. Actually it doesn't - but just putting it on my head  does conjure up all kinds of memories from a trip to the Crescent City a year ago Memorial Day weekend with the bride and sister-in-law for our friend's wedding (the hat acquired on that trip will eventually make a showing).

" Laissez les bons temps rouler," indeed!






Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Five
Super Nola: Insider's tour of New Orleans
Stews: When time is on your side, taste will be too

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Five

Day Twenty-Five / Hat Twenty-Five: David & Young 100% cotton bucket hat in aloha surfer print. 

Hat 3 in  the NC series, this was chosen specifically in honor of the loudly patterned Hawaiian shirts worn by the recently departed James Gandolfini's long-suffering stuntman character Bear from 1995's "Get Shorty."

Related: 

Project Cubbins: Hat Nineteen

Alfred Shaheen, Hawaiian shirt pioneer, 1922-2008

James Gandolfini: A gut reaction to his on-screen style

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Four

Day Twenty-Four / Hat Twenty-Four: Foam-like crocodile head (upper jaw only) with serrated teeth. The second piece of headgear in the NC series, I don't know much about the provenance of this hat except for the fact that it would probably get me noticed if I wore it while partially submerged in a Floridian marsh.

I mention Florida for two following reasons: 1) I'm not totally sure this is a crocodile and not an alligator -- ---- though according to an explanation by the folks at Animal Planet I'm in the clear since "All alligators are crocodiles, but not all crocodiles are alligators" -- and 2) I seem to recall from my trivia monkey days that Florida is the only place where the critters we commonly refer to as crocs and gators (crocodylus acutus and alligator mississippiensis respectively) live side by side.

And now you know it too!

Related:
Like Croc work
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Three
Project Cubbins: Hat Twelve (Nile - not Crocodile)

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Three

Day Twenty-Three / Hat Twenty-Three: Stormy  Kromer Mackinaw Cap (100% wool exterior, 100% cotton lining, "made in U.S.A. in Upper Michigan's Upper Peninsula of Imported Parts").

This is a special hat indeed -- and not just because the description at Stormy Kromer's website describes it as a "heavy-duty head furnace," but also because it marks the first hat in the Noelle series, named in honor of  my co-worker Noelle Carter who has graciously loaned her own extensive and eclectic collection of head gear (two bags full!) to the cause. (As I've already mentioned, I've got hats -- but nowhere near enough to close out Project Cubbins without some loaners. I cribbed my first lid from Dan Fredman on Sunday.)

Look for more from her collection  for the NC Series in the coming days -- except for her turkey hat -- because I've got the same one and I'm hoping we'll BOTH wear them for a Project Cubbins entry closer to Thanksgiving.

Noelle, I tip my head furnace to you.

Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Two
Project Cubbins: Hat One - the games begin
Thanksgiving questions, turducken and turkey hats

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-Two

Day Twenty-Two / Hat Twenty-Two: Black, snapback trucker-style hat with "The  10" in green embroidery Sisters of Los Angeles on the front and SO LA in gray on the back just behind the left ear. It's from a relatively new line called (abbreviated SO LA, which is kind of meta since that's "so L.A.") that started out riffing on some of SoCal's most memorable memes through hats, candles, glassware and the like but has since expanded into other cities (including Atlanta, Chicago and Miami).

If you're drawing a blank at the significance of "The 10" on the hat then you've 1) Spent absolutely no time at all in the City of Angels, and 2) Never seen the drop-dead hilarious "The Californians" sketch on "Saturday Night Live" which parodies (but not by very much) Angelenos' fascination with getting "from the 101 to the 405 on the 10," or something to that affect. (Personally, I prefer to take the  101 past the Chesebro Road exit to the 405 in Sherman Oaks).

Hang on friends and family in the Green Mountain State, at the rate the Sisters of Los Angeles are growing, I wouldn't be surprised to see 802 rocks glasses in time for some holiday nog, and hats emblazoned with "New 7" and "Historic 7A" before snowplows are needed to clear either.

And I think I know just the place that should sell them.

Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-One
Sisters of Los Angeles: New line of L.A.-inspired gifts
Sisters of Los Angeles line adds beach towels, candles

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty-One

Day Twenty-One / Hat Twenty-One: A vintage Borsalino fedora belonging to one Dan Fredman, which he purchased "probably 20 years ago in Pismo Beach."

The photo itself was also taken by Fredman in the Malibu vineyard of dear friend Michalene Busico earlier this afternoon. It should be noted that Dan was game to loan his lid AND snap the photo despite the fact that we'd met for the first time less than an hour before.

You can get a sense of the slope of the vineyard (which is growing Syrah grapes, if I'm not mistaken) by noting the structure in the far upper left of the photo at right -- that's the canopy over the porch of the house.

There will no doubt be more borrowed-lid shots before Project Cubbins has run its course, but Dan has the distinction of being the first.

To you I say: "Huzzah, good sir!"

Related: 
Malibu's backyard vintners
Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty
Project Cubbins: Hat Nineteen

Project Cubbins: Hat Twenty

Day 20 / Hat Twenty: Khaki-colored 100% cotton baseball-style cap with blue and white embroidered logo that reads: "Glacier National Park Centennial" with the year 1910 on the left and the year 2010 on the right. Embroidered in blue on the back of the hat are the words "Celebrate Inspire Engage."

As you might have guessed, I purchased this hat during a 2010 trip to Glacier National Park. I went on the trip over Memorial Day Weekend with my dear, sainted mother Nancy -- who had worked a couple of summers there a half-century earlier and had long regaled me with tales of Edward R. Murrow sitting in the kitchen eating a trout he'd caught earlier that day, or how Marilyn Monroe once got kicked out of the dining room for wearing pants.

The photo on the right is of the two of us (and the hat!) taken during that trip. It was the first weekend f the season that the park was open, and as you can see, it was still winter all around us.

We had a lot of fun on that trip -- and I even photo-bombed some goats.(as evidenced below).

Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Six
Project Cubbins: Hat Nineteen
Los Angeles Times photo gallery: Lodges in Glacier & Waterton Lakes National Parks
  

Project Cubbins: Hat Nineteen

Day Nineteen / Hat Nineteen: White, Ecuadoran-made Panama hat by Borsalino with inner tag that reads "100% paglia" (that's "straw" in Italian folks) and brown grosgrain hatband. I purchased this hat at the Borsalino boutique at Galleria Vittorio Emanuele near my hotel in Milan during my very first trip to cover the men's runway shows for the paper in 2007.

Although it's probably one of my favorites, it doesn't get worn so much. It its the hat that appears in my various and assorted thumbnail photos though, since it seems very reporter-like. Every time I wear it I feel like I should be chomping on a cigar, picking up the handset of an old-school rotary phone and bellowing: "Get me rewrite!"
The shirt is one of my favorites too -- it's a California-themed Reyn Spooner aloha shirt -- it being Friday and all.

Related:
Project Cubbins: Hat Twelve
Project Cubbins: Hat Eighteen
Helpful hint: make a man's hat fit better - with Velcro

Project Cubbins: Hat Eighteen

Day Eighteen / Hat Eighteen: Cotton baseball style cap in weathered red with oval-shaped green and white needlepoint embroidery spelling out. Made by preppy hat purveyor Harding-Lane (exclusively we're told) for Five Seasons, an outlet store in Manchester, Vermont, that's heavy on the Lilly Pulitzer merchandise.

If I'm not mistaken, this one was purchased two summers ago, and I like it so much I sweated one into unwearability so quickly, the bride gave me hers.

And yes, it's another Vermont-themed embroidered hat (I warned you it's not all going to be fezzes and Egyptian headdresses), but this particular one reminds me of a cool bit of trivia about those oval-shaped black-and-white bumper stickers of a bygone Europe. (StickerCafe.com has a brief description). The Euro Oval with the letters VT, I read somewhere, designated a bumper (and presumably a car) from the Vatican.

I'd have laughed pretty hard if I was watching TV and saw the popemobile wind its way through St. Peter's Square with a VT on the bumper. I guess we won't see that until there's a Pope John Deere I.

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Project Cubbins: Hat Seventeen

Project Cubbins: Hat Seventeen

Day Seventeen / Hat Seventeen:  Red felt fez from Fez, Morocco, procured in the cap's namesake city by one Ms. Rose Apodaca, a dear friend and former co-worker (and the R in the A+R Store) who realized early on my love of a good chapeau.

This has to be one of my all-time favorites, not only because it was my first fez (I have two) but because the fez is a key part of "Wives with Knives" my favorite Shag paintings of all time (you can see one of the fez-wearing, tongue-wagging fellows over my shoulder in the photo -- we have a print hanging in our kitchen).

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Project Cubbins: Hat Sixteen

Day Sixteen / Hat Sixteen: Gold-colored Mickey Mouse ears with multi-color embroidered patch that reads: "50 Disneyland Resort."

These ears were purchased during a particularly memorable visit to Disneyland during its 50th anniversary celebrations in which I was accompanied by my bride and my sister-in-law.

My insistence on wearing the hat  for the entirety of the visit was the source of much mirth. I think it makes me look like the fat kid with the buzz cut from Gary Larson's "The Far Side."

By the way, according to the Los Angeles Times' Hugo Martin, Disney theme parks have offered over 200 different varieties of mouse ears for guest to purchase.

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Dapper Day at Disneyland, the nattiest place on Earth
Glowing Disney mouse ears make visitors part of the show

Project Cubbins: Hat Fifteen

Day Fifteen / Hat Fifteen: Navy blue baseball-style cap with multi-color embroidery detail that says "GriffithPark Los Angeles."

I believe this hat joined the collection back during my ill-fated attempts to learn golf  at one of the city's fiune municipal golf courses.

I think it was the Harding Municipal Golf Course -- but I'm not 100% sure of that.

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Project Cubbins: Hat Fourteen

Day Fourteen / Hat Fourteen: Peter Grimm woven straw lifeguard hat with Becker Surfboards embroidered logo patch. Purchased from the 23755 Malibu Road location years ago. I think it's this Mitchs Hat but with a beige cord instead of red as pictured.

In case you're curious, the gin is Plymouth, the tonic Schweppes. The provenance of the lime is unknown.

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Project Cubbins: Hat Thirteen

Day Thirteen / Hat Thirteen: Vintage brown woven fedora with beige silk hatband and jaunty turkey feather, size 7 1/4 circa 1960s. Label inside reads: "ADAM First Name in Hats." Purchased this hat today specifically for Project Cubbins from Hidden Treasures in Topanga Canyon.

 I found this one being worn by a stuffed and mounted boar's head as you can see below.

I think that, in the long run, this place will be helpful, it turned out to be a motherlode of millinery --  including three different takes on the antique diving helmet I've previously mentioned.

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Project Cubbins: Hat Twelve

Hidden Treasures in Topanga is rich in vintage finds

Project Cubbins: Hat Twelve

Day 12 / Hat Twelve: Maybe it's the rapidly approaching weekend, but Fridays are turning out to be the freaky hat day. Case in point; the faux Egyptian headdress with gold metallic and black stripes and gold hooded cobra detail.

I can't recall the specific provenance of this lid, though I suspect it had something to do with a museum gift shop. The tag reads: "Little Daydreamers by Elope" and describes the material as polyethelene foam and polyester fibers.

A quick search turned up this Kid's King Tut hat. How did I end up with that one instead of the adult version? I'd like to think it was an homage to the boy king - but it probably wasn't.

A special hat for a special day, indeed.

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Project Cubbins: Hat Eleven
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Project Cubbins: Hat Eleven

Day Eleven / Hat Eleven: Trucker style cap with mesh back and foam front with a black trout in splashing-through-the-water silhouette (stage left to right) with Orvis in lime green beneath and to stage left.

Another of the sister-in-law series, this is probably the newest hat in the arsenal, hand-delivered from Vermont over Memorial Day weekend.

Note: Unlike with  responsible trout fishing, there will be no catch-and-release of this headgear.

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Rehab a battered hat with fly-fishing flies