Here are 15 of the most memorable:
❚ The Queen’s big, bright, pastel straw hats and, on very special occasions, the bejewelled Imperial State Crown; ❚ Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and her whimsical fascinators such as the cluster of red Maple Leaves she wore in Ottawa on Canada Day 2011;
Former U.S. first lady Jackie Kennedy’s chic, modern pillbox;
Carmen Miranda’s enormous fruit hats in movies like 1943’s The Gang’s All Here;
Johnny Depp’s beribboned, bepinned brocade Mad Hatter topper in Alice in Wonderland (2010);
Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman in fedoras as Rick and Ilsa in Casablanca (1942);
The Cat in the Hat’s candy-canestriped stovepipe hat in the book by Dr. Seuss (first published 1957) and later the movie starring Mike Myers (2003);
Charlie Chaplin’s bowler in Modern Times (1936) and City Lights (1931);
Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Doolittle in a gigantic black-and-white Ascot hat in My Fair Lady (1964);
Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O’Hara in a flirtatious, wide-brimmed straw sun hat in Gone With the Wind — and later, a homemade velvet bonnet designed for nabbing husbands (1939);
Fred Astaire tripping the light fantastic in his top hat in (what else?) Top Hat (1935);
James Dean’s cowboy hat in Giant (1956);
Dianne Keaton’s wide-brimmed unblocked fedora in Annie Hall (1977);
Fess Parker in a coonskin hat in the 1950s TV miniseries, Davy Crockett;
And then, of course, there’s Harrison Ford in his tough explorer’s hat as Indiana Jones in 1981’s Raiders of the Lost Ark. The style was called The Poet, and was designed in 1890 for the London luxury goods store Swaine Adeney Brigg and modified to look more rugged for the film. Even today, the Indy is a bestseller. We’ll raise a hat to that.