16″ Low Crown Straw Hat

This straw hat measures 16″ in diameter & has a low crown of about 1/2″. These hats were meant to sit on top of the head. To keep your hat on, the women would use a silk ribbon that attaches to the hat on the crown & tied under the chin or behind your neck. Sometimes a hat pin was used pushed through the crown & into the hair to assist the silk tie. These hats were often decorated with wide silk ribbons around the crown & occasionally birds or silk flowers. Most commonly the hat is covered in black or white silk (& sometimes other colors) usually the underside is lined in the same color of silk but sometimes red, white, blue lined the underside regardless if the top is covered. This hat is shown plain & sold this way for you to decorate as you like. Women of the 18th century wore these hats over their linen or cotton cap when outside most commonly in the early to mid century. Bonnets were also worn over the cap while outside but became more common after the 1760s although hats remained common. For example as found in Wives, Slaves, & Servant Girls in the Pennsylvania Packet of 1775 “Ran Away . . .  a servant girl . . .  had one when she went away, a . . .  straw hat.”.

In the picture the 14″ is at the top with a 16″ bellow it. Both are sitting on dark grey silk with blue 2″ ribbon.