Nearly a year ago I was obsessed with a certain leopard print fedora at J. Crew. I declined to pre-order it, however, and it sold out by the time I went into a store to try it out. Bust! Although to be fair, I tried it on in a different color and didn’t like how it fit. I never like how hats fit. Fast forward to now, I have some good news and bad news.
Good news: The leopard fedora is back! In an Albertus Swanepoel for J. Crew collaboration.
Bad news: at $178, it is way out of my funemployed budget.
Good news: Albertus Swanepoel is also doing a collaboration with Target. And look what I found:
Even better news: at $19.99, this baby is way in my budget. Especially for a hat skeptic like me.
Do you find it weird that he practically made the same hat for two different stores? It’s like he knocked off his own design! But given that the point of a high-low collaboration is to appeal to new audiences, he is certainly maximizing his reach.
Writing this post made me curious about his independent work, so I did a little bit of online digging and found that is his past two fall collections, Swanepoel has used this two-tone leopard print, albeit in shapes far less familiar than the fedora.
Personally I’m thrilled that I get to try out this print in a shape I’m familiar with, but for the hat veterans out there, which style do you prefer?
What's your opinion?