Lock & Co. Hatters
St. James's, London· Est. 1676· $$$
- Signature
- Bespoke and ready-to-wear caps from the world's oldest hatter
- Best for
- A heirloom-grade tweed cap from the original London hatter
- Known for
- Eight-piece, Ivy, Flat cap
- Ships from
- United Kingdom
James Lock & Co. has been making hats at 6 St James's Street since 1676 — they sold Nelson the bicorne he died in, and they invented the bowler. They are, by some distance, the oldest hat shop in the world. Their flat-cap line is small, considered, and very, very good.
The Muirfield and the Glencairn are the workhorses — eight-piece caps in proper estate tweeds, lined in cotton, finished by hand in their workshop. They also do bespoke: walk into the shop on St James's Street, get conformatour'd, choose your cloth, wait a few weeks. The price reflects the address and the bench time.
Buy here when you want something that will outlast you and that has a story behind it. The cap will be a fraction of the price of a Lock fedora, but it will be made with the same hands.
Cap styles Lock & Co. Hatters is known for
- The Scally Cap →A short-brimmed, eight-panel wool or tweed cap with working-class roots in Ireland, Scotland and the north of England.
- The Ivy Cap →A clean, low-profile two- or four-panel cap with a short snap-front brim — the polished American cousin of the flat cap.
- The Flat Cap →The umbrella term for the soft, short-brimmed working man's cap — the family that includes the scally, ivy, driver and newsboy.