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Whose hats? Seuss' hats

June 3, 2013

A traveling selection of hats, helmets, bonnets and caps once owned by Dr. Seuss has stopped off at a Laguna Beach, Calif., art gallery.

The touring “Hats Off to Dr. Seuss!” exhibit is part of a yearlong celebration to mark the 75th anniversary of Theodor Seuss Geisel’s second book, “The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins,” and it is the first time the eclectic collection of headgear, curated by Chase Art Cos., has traveled outside the Seuss estate.

According to press materials accompanying the exhibit, the good doctor (who died in 1991) was “an avid hat collector known to wear one of his crazy hats for inspiration while writing, and at dinner parties it was often a tradition for each guest to wear a hat. … In his artwork, as in his personal life, Dr. Seuss … was aware of the inherent magic in hats.”

There are black-and-white convict caps, a teeny tiny sombrero, a black topper, Chinese caps, white fuzzy marching band busbys, fierce-looking pickelhaubes (the spiked helmets once favored by the Prussian military), embroidered naval caps and all manner of fancy, floppy felt chapeaus festooned with colorful Seussian-appropriate plumage.

Of all the hats, there are two in particular that will make a Seussophile’s heart grow three sizes. The first is a towering stovepipe top hat with three wide horizontal bands of red interspersed with two of white — the sartorial calling card of the Cat in the Hat himself. Though the exhibit doesn’t solve the riddle of which came first — this hat or the cat’s — it’s fun to see this one up close.

The second hat is a simple, unassuming cap of red felt with a sloping crown and accented with a single large white feather — a hat nearly identical to Bartholomew Cubbins’.

The Fingerhut Gallery of Laguna Beach will host the hat exhibit through June 2.

If you miss the cat’s many hats this time around, the touring exhibit’s full schedule can be found at www.drseussart.com/hatsoff.

 



McClatchy Tribune