I’ve started making custom cowboy hats, but I don’t have all the hat-making equipment I’m going to need quite yet. Turns out not everyone has the same size head, and even if two people do have the same head size, they might want different crown heights or shapes. It’s very inconvenient, because that means I need a bunch of different blocks to build the different hats.
I can get new ones, and there are some really good ones made by people with 3D printers. They work just fine, and they’re not terribly expensive, but there’s just something about old-school hat blocks that I like. So I’ve been scouring flea markets and antique stores looking for the traditional, wooden hat blocks to build hats on.
I have had very little luck with this search. However, I’ve found a treasure-trove of good, old-fashioned outdoor gear in those markets. Like hat-making supplies, outdoor gear manufacturing has seen a revolution with new technology. For the most part, this is a good thing. The new gear is lighter and more weather-resistant. But you can’t deny the allure of a pair of giant, wood-and-leather-lace beavertail snowshoes. They’re just cool. Yes, they’re five times the weight of a decent pair of new-fangled snowshoes, and the new ones can be a quarter the size of those old ones and do twice as good a job holding you on top of the snow. But they’re just not as awesome.
Those flea markets often have tons of great fishing gear, too, and other outdoor gear that still works. And because it’s in a flea market, it’s usally not very expensive.
So I still need a lot of hat blocks, but I now have a really nice set of five-foot beavertail snowshoes. I can’t wait to test them out when it finally snows again.
