Pressure Makes Diamonds Hats

Diana Ross said pressure made the diamond in 1971. Gary Johnson, a defensive lineman for the 49ers, said pressure busts pipes in 1985. Somewhere between those two sentences is every motivational poster, locker room speech and Sunday-night message from your manager you have ever received, and the honest answer is that both men were right. This collection takes both sides. Half of these hats mean it. No pressure no diamonds, pressure makes diamonds, set large in bold sans on black, navy and red the way the phrase actually gets used: as a flat statement with no hedging in it. The other half have read the geology. Diamonds form ninety to a hundred and fifty miles underground over one to three billion years, they are not made from coal, and coal is roughly seven hundred million years too young to be involved. Every encouraging thing about the proverb survives that correction except the timeline, which is the funniest part to put on a hat. So there is a hat here that says pressure makes diamonds in about a billion years, one that admits it is still under pressure and still not a diamond, and one that has quietly worked out which side of the pipe metaphor it landed on. Wear the version you believe on the day you believe it. Each is embroidered on a structured six-panel cap, $29.99.