HATESSNESS IS NOW OLD HAT

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31346, 17 April 1967, Page 10

HATESSNESS IS NOW OLD HAT

A generation ago the teen-men of the world took a snitch on hats. Before long many of their elders were following their example.

In a negative kind of way, hatlessness became a fashion. It began as the young man’s rebellion against convention and it settled into a convention itself.

Now, in their turn, the new generation of teen-men are rebelling against the convention of hatlessness. The surprising thing, perhaps, is that hatlessness should have had so long a run. It is against nature, so to speak, for a man to go without a headpiece. In America, recently, the Museum of Natural History had an exhibit entitled “Above the Neck,” which demonstrated that from prehistoric times the male has been a soft touch for ornamentation on the head. There he has instinctively concentrated his assertions of status, personality and mood—even when the rest of him was bare.

In point of fact, even at its height the cult of bareheadedness was not all that strict. The young have never been able to resist mod millinery. It was only formal hats that they ban-

ned. Perhaps they could not be blamed for refusing orthodox styles. Hats have been the last articles of male apparel to come Into line with modern fashion trends. The teen-men’s return to hat-wearing has been via offbeat styles worn for kicks on informal occasions—but now he is forswearing hatlessness altogether. He is outlawing it His new attitude is that the elegant lines of the modern suit are denied a necessary focal point if they are not topped by a hat that complements them. The total look is today’s fashion aim. It can’t be total without a hat.