Steampunk Hats

Airship captains and Victorian inventors are real festival personas: AP photographed both at a New Zealand steampunk gathering. Its reporting also follows the work behind the fantasy, from sewing and metalworking to hat-trimming and steam mechanics. Teapot racing and parasol dueling share the programme with that practical inventiveness. There is room here for a maker's pride and for a completely unreasonable imaginary machine. These steampunk hats give that combination a voice. STEAMPUNK and AIRSHIP CAPTAIN announce the allegiance; INVENTOR claims the workshop. TIME TRAVELER LIVING IN THE PAST turns the clock backward, while WHY IS MY FUTURE MADE OF PLASTIC? supplies the complaint. ROYAL SOCIETY OF UNNECESSARY GEARS makes decorative excess a deliberately ridiculous institution. The double-parked airships and brass-plated bad ideas belong to the wearer's fantasy, with no engineering credentials required. Choose a short badge or a longer deadpan declaration. The unnecessary-gears society and the brass-plated bad ideas each come in two colorways, with serif lettering giving their grand claims a suitably straight face. Every design is custom embroidered on a dad hat, ready for the next outfit or an ordinary day with extraordinary transport plans.