Top hat c. 1910

This is A.F. Herbermann’s ‘Top Hat’, with a height of 16.5 cm and a circumference of 85 cm. There's something so simple and sculptural about this hat. It’s like a minimalist form, so solid, so still. I think about Herbermann making this. Were they thinking about how to create a perfect silhouette? I can imagine them carefully stretching and smoothing the material to create this cylindrical form, like how a sculptor would shape clay. And the material itself – the way the light hits its surface gives it an almost painterly quality. I think about all the hat-makers who have come before and after Herbermann, each one working within the traditions of this particular art form, riffing on the same themes. Ultimately it's about expression. It's about finding our own voice and adding to the collective song of art-making.