Monday Morning Eye Candy: The Mad Hatter or The Madder Hat?

I think hats have finally hit the big time. Over the past few seasons they have slowly been creeping into the category of 'essential accessory' alongside handbags and sunglasses, but now I feel as if they have gotten to collection status (ie. fashionistas will be keeping a hat collection within their wardrobes).

This is none more demonstrated than in the lovely Blogger Crush feature from Drop Dead Gorgeous Daily. I receive their super fashion-informative and eye-candyish emails with glee on a regular basis, and have noticed that many of the blogger on which they crush seem to wear hats as an essential component of their outfit.

This advancement is great on so many levels. Firstly, hats have an uncanny way to transform an outfit from blah to 'oh yes!' in a cost-efficient way. Just check out Dotti's current range and see how the outfits they style them with would be so vanilla without the addition of the featured hat. (Not that vanilla is bad, personally vanilla is my favourite flavour for ice-cream. It's just often that vanilla with an additional topping is awesome and makes the vanilla flavour all the more sensational.) My personal favourite is the 70's Floppy Hat in Rust. Love it.

70's Floppy Hat from Dotti

Secondly, it means that when I wear my massive broad brimmed 70's style white straw hat at the beach, no-one will give me odd looks anymore (which should never have happened in the first place, but rather I should have been applauded on the spot for being so sun smart, providing shade to cover my head and shoulders).

And finally, it means that we can all push the boundaries of hats and no longer stick to the plain old beanie that keeps our head warm during winter. Like this extremely covetable Bear Face Beanie from Asos, which I think is the cutest thing I have seen in a long, long time. I actually saw two people on the street wearing it the other day. The first was a fashionista and when spotted her I instantly thought "I must have the hat!". The second was a girl I presumed to be about 10 and either had the hat bought for her by her Mum who thought it was cute and appropriate for a 10-year girl, or who had borrowed it from her super stylish Mum who liked to wear unconventional hats.

So with that I say go forth and try a new trend - go get yourself a Mad Hat.