Hats: An Anthology by Stephen Jones—a collaboration between the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and Stephen Jones, the world’s foremost hat designer—is at the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Mass.through February 3, 2013. It is the second venue in the U.S, after new york City’s Bard Graduate Center show. The exhibition, which had over 100,000 visitors at the V&A, displays more than 250 hats chosen with the expert eye of the master milliner.
On display are hats ranging from a twelfth-century Egyptian fez to a 1950s Balenciaga hat and couture creations by Jones and his contemporaries. To show the universal appeal of wearing hats, Jones has chosen a wide variety of styles such as motorcycle helmets, turbans, berets, and a child’s plastic tiara. There also are hats worn by celebrities such as Madonna, Brad Pitt and Keira Knightley. For the special exhibition at the BGC, the curators have arranged for loans particularly relevant to the United States, including Babe Ruth’s baseball cap, Mouseketeer ears, Estee Lauder’s turban, Halston bunny ears worn by Candace Bergen to Truman Capote’s Black & White Ball, and the top hat worn by President Franklin Roosevelt to his fourth inauguration. There is also a display of work by contemporary New York milliners: Ellen Christine, Rod Keenan, Eugenia Kim, Lola, Jennifer Ouellette, Albertus Swanepoel, and Patricia Underwood.