Ritch Rand Designs

Our Process

Hello Friends, 

As you may know, Rand’s Custom Hats and its store were sold again in 2020 and I am no longer affiliated with it. After forty-plus years creating handmade custom hats, I have moved on to the next chapter of my life focusing on using my decades of experience in the hat business to conserving and repairing favorite hats, family heirlooms and even priceless, museum artifacts. Each hat requires a unique approach and unless you bring it to me in shreds, I can most likely return it to an attractive, wearable condition you will be pleased with. 

Over the years I have learned that every hat tells a story – your story – and that story doesn’t need to end. If you have a hat that has been “well loved” and you are wondering if it can survive, I bet I can help save your hat. 

Please feel free to contact me if I can help you with your headwear needs. 

— Ritch Rand

Hat Renovating and Conserving – $200.00.

Most hats that are worn a great deal will need these basic fixes on a semi-regular basis: a complete cleaning, blocking stiffening, re-shaping and possibly the addition of all new parts. We take the hat apart and hand clean the body using our formulated solutions. If there are left over stains from the grease and dirt, we have few choices left as hats that have faded or are discolored by perspiration cannot be re-dyed. With the hat body cleaned, we block and iron the hat, add stiffener and body builders to help support the body of the hat. Then we iron the crown and the brim so we can restore the size needed for the customer. If needed we hand sew in a new leather sweatband, add a new silk hat lining and let the hat dry. You may require or choose a new hatband. If so, we have many options to choose from. The last step is to reshape the hat to fit your wishes. (Remember, there could some fading and discoloring, even after we finish as every piece of fur felt is different.)

Complete Hat Restoration and Conservation – Price Upon Inspection.

I have been told over the years that I provide the best hat “fixing” in America. If you think your hat is done for, let me look at it first. If we can save it, we do what is described above but much more. We take the entire hat apart – and remove all parts of the hat including the edge trim binding. After hand cleaning your hat several times to make sure all perspiration and dirt are removed, we then – believe it or not – turn the hat inside out if necessary for additional inspection and cleaning. Then we turn the hat around front to back to start the sanding and ironing process to try and strengthen the weak spots on the brim and the soft spots on the crown or crease areas. Then the stiffening and drying process starts and requires multiple layers of the fur felt to be stiffened, dried and stiffened again. Then the hat is pressed at two hundred degrees to iron in the stiffener. This action will require a wooden block to be placed back in the hat to start the sanding process and finishing the texture so that the hat will be soft to the touch once again. Then we finish the hat as described above and water repellent and a final re-crease and shape to your liking.