On the first day with the new guests arriving from all over the world, we went to the international hat festival in Septfonds. Not the largest event I have seen but amazing none-the-less.
The entire town was decorated for the event. Here and there I saw the posters and these charming cement hats springing up from the ground! I am not sure if they are there permanently or not. Septfonds is the hat capitol of France and has been for many years. This is where Willy's hat making factory is that we visited last week.
The first place we visited was a display of vintage french hats! It was really hard not to touch these, as I wanted to examine how they were made. So instead, I photographed them all. Here are a few of my favorites.
You can see more at Vintage French Hats
In the next exhibit there were lots of hats entered into a competition. As you can see the hats were very whimsical and made out of just about anything!
Then it was outside to the festival itself! There were many booths with skilled artisans demonstrating their craft, from lace-making and hat forming to hat stand carving.
Lace Making
Hat forming (by machine)
Hat stand carving
And of course there were hats for sale! All kinds and all price ranges. Some of the favorites:
Lucy's darling mom with a "to die for" hat!
And these fabulous creations made with vintage straw braid from Italy:
A great time was had by all at the hat festival. Getting us inspired for our week of hat making with Dillon.
Note, I am back-dating these posts to the actual day that they occured. I wrote this one on July 24, 2009.