Summer Hats - Updated

Article: Summer Hats

by Marc Noon  

07/12/2017

Summer hats are a necessity in downtown Los Angeles if you are an avid walker around the sites and scenes here, but also seek some protection from the sun.  The mid-day sun can be particularly brutal if walking outside for more than an hour leaving burns on your hairline, face, shoulders and especially the back of your neck.  Wearing a summer hat can help cut down on the brutality of it all and allow you have a more enjoyable time while meeting the goals of your daily outings.

One of my goals is to avoid the rays wherever possible.  Taking the side of the street with more shade is not always possible especially when its more convenient to take the open crosswalk.  Another option to avoid the rays would be to go into a covered area like an open mall that is mostly covered but has areas that are exposed to the sunlight.  Still they don’t offer the same freedom and coverage that a summer hat offers.

According to Wikipedia’s article  that I’ve read, a rather small article on summer hat’s, a summer hat should cover the entire head, the back of the neck, and portions of your shoulders.  If it doesn’t then it is maybe something other than a summer hat.   

I’ve been looking at summer hats because I’m starting to get a pretty bad burn on the back of my neck and am looking for something that can remedy my situation and help me maintain a certain level of fashion sense, but also maintaining a valued degree of comfort while walking around the downtown area.   A summer hat is definitely a valuable tool, though I have not seen too many people taking advantage of these hats.  So in all likelihood you will stand out a little bit as you utilize them in your daily jaunts.

If you have a walking buddy as I do, it may be a good idea to keep each other protected from the sun by wearing the hats often.  In addition, other people may see it as a possible remedy to their walking  in the sun as well.  If more people wear them then the hats may not be a fashion faux pas as others keep up enough appearances to make it a practical and less than embarrassing venture.   Though, people may mistake your venture for a historic hat scene for a new movie production and just gawk at you.

So, what do the hats look like?  The ones I’ve seen are rather deep and are lifted about an inch above your head and fit snuggly around the outer perimeter of your skull.  It shouldn’t mess up your hair too much.  There are styles for both men and women and of course there are also unisex version out there.

One thing that may be noticeable about summer hats is that they are lighter in color usually, and they have generally stood the test of time at maintaining adequate airflow through the rest of the head it covers.  Usually the hat is made of some form of wicker material, or weave of straw and the brim of the hat can also help protect the eyes from the mid-day sun.  There is a good U.K. Hat Guide article on hat materials that I found useful.

Figure 1 - Female Summer Hat

  A guy’s hat is usually big and broad and is a little more on the functional side of things.   It could also be a perfect lead in line to talk with a co-worker or passerby to then lead to a casual conversation.    My head is 7 ¼ to 7 3/8  inch in U.S. hat sizes.   So, you should have your head measured before a purchase.  See this article on U.S. hat sizing which I found very useful.

   I recommend wearing clothing, especially a shirt, with a summer hat that is a light-colored cotton material and that reflects most of the sunlight.    Also wearing sunglasses is not recommended unless the sun light is coming in at an angle that shines on your eyes.

That’s all I have for this article on summer hats.  I haven’t yet bought a hat, but I have been doing some research on summer hats and thought I’d share.   My next article will most likely be about my direct experience wearing a summer hat in downtown Los Angeles and whether the experience was good, bad, or somewhere in between.  If you have any more information on summer hats please feel free to share your blog posts.