We are more than pleased to present our first prod­uct col­lab­o­ra­tion together with Finnish hat man­u­fac­turer Fredrik­son. The prod­uct is a recon­struc­tion of a for­got­ten clas­sic cap made of the finest wool avail­able. Fredrik­son, with its long, vivid his­tory, tra­di­tional ways of man­u­fac­tur­ing and upmost respect for eth­i­cal val­ues, was a per­fect part­ner to work with in this spe­cial project.

Fredrik­son is the milliner for us Finns. Var­i­ous of their mod­els have been a sta­ple in our grand­fa­thers’ wardrobes, and not even after ages of heavy use have they lost a bit of their form or appeal. Clas­sics never die, they only get bet­ter, and this woolen cap is a great exam­ple of that. It has lasted for decades in the heads of ath­letes and states­men and hope­fully con­tin­ues to do so for many more to come with this rein­tro­duced version.

Early design phase and the first prototype.

Back­ground

The woolen cap was orig­i­nally taken into use by the Finnish civil mili­tia in the early 1900s. The Finnish national team adopted the cap to boost their per­for­mance in the Win­ter Olympics in 1936, 1948 and 1956. Due to its firm con­struc­tion and adap­tive ear flaps it was even suit­able for the high-flying ski-jumpers. Later in the cen­tury the leg­endary Finnish pres­i­dent Urho Kekko­nen has been among the proud wear­ers of the cap in sev­eral occa­sions. The orig­i­nal name of the model,” Urho”, is believed to stem from the president.

The archives.

Despite being an inte­gral part of Finnish her­itage, this woolen cap has not been in pro­duc­tion in its orig­i­nal form at least in past three decades. It is an honor for us to present a remake of the time­less clas­sic. The model is based on the orig­i­nal design, where we have added a small, nat­ural white detail on the brim to iden­tify this one time col­lab­o­ra­tion. There is only an edi­tion of 100 caps man­u­fac­tured and labeled together with Mash­mar­ket, and all the prod­ucts are exclu­sive to our online store.

Prod­uct details

The cap is made of wool with a warm lin­ing inside. The earflaps with strings, which by default are knot­ted on top of the head, can as well be hung loose on the side or be tied together through the two holes in the brim for bet­ter shield against cold winds. The mate­ri­als and design make the cap weath­er­proof, and it is guar­an­teed not to lose its shape even in extreme con­di­tions or in heavy use.

Fredrik­son

Fredrik­son was founded in 1887 by mer­chan­diser Anton Fredrik­son. After sev­eral years of pro­duc­ing neck­ties and bow ties, he decided to expand his busi­ness to hat design. Through over its 100-year his­tory the com­pany has been pro­duc­ing a diverse range of prod­ucts from fur acces­sories to pat­terned damasks and leather gloves, but has now returned solely to its core exper­tise, hats.

Fredrik­son is still a pri­vately owned com­pany and one of the most respected hat man­u­fac­tur­ers in North­ern Europe. With deep roots as fam­ily busi­ness, local pro­duc­tion is highly val­ued, and the orig­i­nal fac­tory in the town of Jyväskylä in South­ern Fin­land is still in full effect. The man­u­fac­tur­ing process of every sin­gle hat involves a great deal of hand­i­craft by skilled arti­sans fol­low­ing in the foot­steps of the old masters.

The com­pany hosts an in-house research unit for ana­lyz­ing and map­ping out suit­able mate­ri­als from dif­fer­ent sup­pli­ers to meet their eth­i­cal cri­te­ria. Fredrik­son only uses cer­tifi­cated, high-quality mate­ri­als. New prod­ucts also fea­ture recy­cled mate­ri­als and fibers. Fredrikson’s eth­i­cally respon­si­ble stance com­pre­hends both the man­u­fac­tur­ing and the mate­ri­als — another rea­son why we are so glad to be part of this release.

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www.fredrikson.fi

The prod­uct is now avail­able in our online store.

Photo cred­its Matti Tanskanen.