Chris Christmas, a fourth-generation Black cowboy with Native American roots, considers the cowboy hat to be an indispensable a part of his heritage.
“I believe I used to be born with a cowboy hat,” mentioned the 57-year-old Denverite, whose household has resided in Colorado for 120 years. With dozens of hats in his assortment at present, “I purchase them like sneakers,” he laughed.
Christmas is urgent in opposition to the longstanding stereotype of a white-washed American West by working with hat shaper Parker Orms on a line of headwear stylized on “the untold legacy” of Black cowboy tradition.
“As a result of that they had come from slavery, there wasn’t an excessive amount of they needed to symbolize their wealth besides their horse, their hat and their scarf,” Christmas mentioned in an interview. “Your id was based mostly in your hat.”
An American renaissance of the Wild West and its traditions is placing the enduring cowboy hat again within the highlight. Lately, enterprise has boomed for Colorado’s hat shapers — a number of of whom had the household commerce handed right down to them — as they meet demand from metropolis slickers and cattle palms alike for his or her customized headwear.
On a Monday afternoon in early December, 32-year-old Orms stood behind his work bench behind clothes retailer Haven at 257 Fillmore St. in Denver’s Cherry Creek neighborhood. Since he moved into the area in October, hats of various types and colours have hung from the partitions, with twin neon indicators of a cowboy and cowgirl glowing close by.
First, Orms chosen a hat — Rodeo King model, mild blue in coloration and felt manufactured from a beaver/rabbit fur mix. Then, he bathed it in a cloud of steam. Inside a half hour, he’d formed the hat himself, forming a cattleman crease on its crown together with his fingers.
The Wheat Ridge native is a third-generation hat shaper, following within the footsteps of his father, Glenn, and his late grandfather, Dewey, who plied the commerce for over six a long time.
“They taught me the artwork of hat shaping,” Orms mentioned. “It’s a household factor.”
He by no means anticipated to study hat shaping at 23 years previous. Rising up, he predominantly centered on sports activities, and soccer introduced him to the College of Colorado to play as a defensive again. Orms spent his final season in Milan, Italy, enjoying for the Rhinos Milano — the nation’s skilled league — the place the “style capital” made its mark on him.
As soon as he returned to Colorado, he joined his father and grandfather on the rodeo circuit, and formed hats for the primary time on the Nationwide Western Inventory Present.
Orms began his personal enterprise, Hats by Parker Thomas, about two years in the past. For a customized hat, he expenses between $250 to $450, with additional companies like hat cleansing and reshaping for $50 and hat branding for $25.
“Western tradition’s actually in proper now,” notably after the COVID-19 pandemic pushed extra folks open air, he mentioned in an interview. “There’s folks all around the nation — even the world — which are wanting cowboy hats, and there isn’t anyone of their city that does what we do.”
His market continues to develop as he companies extra weddings and Western-themed occasions. Orms, who’s formed hats in Paris Trend Week and at Las Vegas’ Nationwide Finals Rodeo, enjoys watching his “trendy, Western stylish” creations journey throughout the globe through social media.
Orms desires of at some point fathering a son who may even form hats and compete as an athlete. However till then, he and his personal dad have plans of their very own: teaming as much as educate a brand new class, Hat Masters, the place they present others “the artwork of hat shaping.”
Papa Orms and the Cow Lot
Not like his son, Glenn Orms, 67, at all times knew he’d be part of the household enterprise.
“Hats have been the one factor that I knew I beloved,” the Wheat Ridge resident mentioned in an interview.
In his hometown of Wichita Falls, Texas, “we at all times had hats in our home,” Orms mentioned. He can recall a photograph of himself at 3 years previous, cowboy hat on his head.
His father, Dewey, rode horses bareback as a rodeo cowboy, and befriended rodeo announcer Nat Fleming. In 1952, the late Fleming opened the Cow Lot, a Western retail retailer that supplied cowboys with boots and hats shortly — a much-needed enterprise of their Texas neighborhood as a result of, on the time, it might take months for orders to course of at different institutions.
After Dewey married, he made a profession change, working on the Cow Lot to help his new household. Orms — the eldest son — “grew up in that retailer,” and labored there himself in highschool.
He moved to Colorado in 1982, proper after 1978 TV sequence “Dallas” and 1980 movie “City Cowboy” spurred nationwide curiosity in cowboy tradition. As we speak, he’s seeing its revival, which he credit to ongoing TV sequence “Yellowstone” and the mainstream acceptance of nation music.
When Orms began his personal hat firm in 2011, he requested Fleming if he might borrow the title — the Cow Lot — to “maintain it alive.” And at his location at 10800 E. forty sixth Ave. in Denver, Orms nonetheless serves the wants of cowboys, similar to he did in Texas.
However he’s seeing excessive demand outdoors of his conventional clients, with TikTok and different social media platforms elevating his enterprise profile. Orms even served a pair of women who traveled straight to Colorado from Switzerland for his hats.
“Each producer is out of product,” Orms mentioned. “2019 thus far has been unbelievable.”
On the Cow Lot, clients should purchase a hat as cheap as $69 and as expensive as $1,950, “hand-shaped to your liking.”
However on the subject of estimating what number of hats his palms have formed, “there’s no option to inform,” Orms mentioned. Within the coming months, he predicts that he’ll promote hundreds of hats at occasions just like the Nationwide Finals Rodeo and the Nationwide Western Inventory Present.
Though the trade will inevitably evolve — hats “could also be 3D printed certainly one of today” — he’s at all times searching for different avenues to raised compete. For instance, he’s introducing new companies like hat renovation: taking previous hats as soon as worn by shoppers’ grandparents — former rodeo queens and retired cowboys — and reviving them.
“Whenever you put a cowboy hat on, you stroll just a little taller. You get just a little swagger,” Orms mentioned. “You are feeling totally different.”
“Oldest Stetson seller west of the Mississippi”
On the three-hour drive from Denver to Steamboat Springs, vacationers can spot handmade yellow signs posted all through northwest Colorado that publicize F.M. Light & Sons. About 100 of these street indicators have been arrange a century in the past, and so they’re nonetheless standing at present, guiding drivers to the historic Western attire retailer at 830 Lincoln Ave. in Steamboat.
Based in 1905, “it’s nonetheless in the identical location and nonetheless in the identical household,” mentioned co-owner Chris Dillenbeck, 41. His spouse Lindsay — the great-great granddaughter of F.M. Gentle — counts because the fifth era to run the enterprise.
The institution offers predominantly in cowboy hats and boots — a degree enforced by the shop’s distinct leather-based odor. Based on native legend, “we’re the oldest Stetson seller west of the Mississippi,” Dillenbeck mentioned, referring to the well-known Stetson cowboy hats. “Nobody’s argued that that’s not true but.”
F.M. Gentle & Sons additionally carries different manufacturers like Texas’ Dorfman Milano, California’s Bailey and Australia’s Akubra Hats. Its hat costs vary between beneath $100 to $500, and the group affords free shaping on the retailer.
As a result of Dillenbeck’s dad served within the Air Pressure, he spent his adolescence dwelling overseas and all through the U.S. Spending his maturity promoting Western put on in a Colorado ski city “can be about the very last thing I assumed I might be doing once I was a child, however I find it irresistible,” he mentioned.
Dillenbeck might additionally by no means image himself sporting a cowboy hat till Stetson gifted him one. Now, he encourages all of his clients: “You’re undecided about it, however, when you truly get one and put it on — everybody can pull off a cowboy hat.”
