Grading Panama Hats

Grading Panama hats is not an easy task. The fact of the matter is that no industry standard guides the grading of Panama hats anywhere in the world. Sellers use numbers, complicated math, or fancy brand names to sell their Panama hats. Some sellers don't say anything about what grade their Panama hats are, nor do they offer an explanation for their grading of Panama hats. Go figure.

The Five-Tier System

We get e-mails almost every day asking about the number grade of our Panama hats. In our experiences in Montecristi, we've heard of only five grade-names for Panama hats: grueso, medio-fino, fino, superfino, and extrafino. If you roam around Montecristi, that's what you'll hear. Grueso means "coarse" or "thick" in Spanish. Medio-Fino means "medium fine." Fino means "fine." Superfino and Extrafino equate to "super fine" and "extra fine." The photo is of a Panama Hatworks of Montecristi Select 0 Panama hat and has between 800–900 weaves per square inch. I’d love to say that the Panama hat has 30 weaves by 30 weaves per square inch, but it is more likely to have 32 weaves by 27 weaves in that square inch. The weaving parallel to the brim is tighter than the weaving perpendicular to the brim due to the weave's nature.

We don't use the tier system because it isn't definitive enough. Honestly, Grueso hats are coarse, choppy and just plain plain . . . good enough for yard work and the beach. We’ll sell them if you want them, ($14.00 apiece + s/h, please inquire). The Finos — Medio, Fino, Super, Extra — Panama hats range from a weave count of 12 to over 40 weaves per square inch. Big difference! How can we justify calling all of them Finos when one is nine times (three times three: it's weaves per square inch) more fino than the other? We can't. It would take a weaver nine times longer to weave a hat with 36 weaves per linear inch than 12 weaves and, naturally, the price should be nine times more because of the time involved. As far as Superfino and Extrafino, we're happy to use those names, but prefer Fino-fino to allow for the many people who use Extrafino or Superfino as catch-phrases to mark up their prices. This photo is of a "select 1" and has roughly 600 weaves per square inch. Again, doing the math, that's between 24 and 25 weaves per linear inch. That's a good hat!

Hat Vueltas

Something else we don't focus on is the counting of the number of vueltas on the inside of the hat. Vuelta means "a turn, return, or return trip" in Spanish. It actually is the number of concentric circles you could count if you put the crown of the hat up to a light. The term vuelta is sometimes used to represent the weave density . . . the more vueltas, supposedly, the better the quality. A vuelta line is actually the junction where strands of paja toquilla were added radially as the hat was woven. Since the hat starts out as a disk, as the crown then progresses downwards on the sides and then outward to form the brim, obviously strands must be added as this disk increases in diameter every few weaves. Vueltas are the lines formed when strands are added due to the doubling of the fiber at that point, splicing new strands in, nothing more. The photo above is actual size and shows the vueltas (for your visual enjoyment!) in a Montecristi belonging to Chuck Brown, www.cuencanet.com, that has a 30x25 linear-inch weave count, or 780 weaves per square inch. It is our educated opinion that the vuelta count isn't an accurate definitive measuring stick of fineness. It is at best a lazy man's weave indication. Rather than taking 30 seconds to simply count the weaves per inch, people accept the number of vueltas as the determining factor in fineness. (Semi-lazies can count half an inch and multiply by two!) In short, the number of vueltas do not a fine hat make. Sure, the more fine the hat, the more vueltas the crown of the hat will have. However, crown dimensions naturally vary with the hat size!

The Focus of PHM

The focus of Panama Hatworks of Montecristi is procuring the best hats for you for the least $$$$ and providing a steady stream of work for the artisans. Panama Hatworks of Montecristi works with a fair number of Panama-hat-making families, focusing on purchasing the finest Panama hat bodies on the basis of color uniformity, backweave, weave consistency, weave quality, weave density, and good looks — all for the best price — to pass savings and quality on to you. We simply buy the best from the best and painstakingly spend the time to do it. So no matter what hat we stock, it's a good hat and priced strictly according to quality, instead of hype or the fame of our "brand name." We sell hats, not fame. This magnified photo is of a "select 2" and has around 400+ weaves per square inch. A $3.00 calculator says that's 20 weaves per linear inch and that's a pretty good hat and not all that expensive.

We "grade" our hats on weaves per inch and if you want to use some nomenclature, then Superfino and Fino might do.

The Bottom Line

It's simply best to talk in terms of quality as to how many average weaves per square inch a hat exhibits. A lot of sellers don't fess up to that number or even offer a key to their grading system that incorporates weaves per inch, and some don't even mention a grade of any kind in their websites. Yet the number of weaves is directly proportional to the amount of work the hat required and the cost of the paja toquilla and therefore the value and cost of the completed Panama hat. Doesn't it make you wonder why they are mysterious? Why don't they give the weave count? What are they hiding? There is no hidden valley inhabited by elves who manufacture Superfino or Fino hats for one dollar. The prices are based on quality and are the same from one end of Montecristi to the other. It's all according to the market itself just as with the London Gold Fix or the Rappaport Diamond Guide. Please, when you have any question whatsoever about what grade and quality of hat you'll be getting for your hard-earned money, email us and we will literally count the weaves for you and be straight up about it. Besides, talking to our customers is the best part of this business.

FAQs

Read comments and questions asked by our customers to get more insight into the world of the Montecristi Panama hat. A visit to our FAQS and Answers page, can expose some "secrets" that sellers know and most end users don't.

© 2009; Panama Hatworks of Montecristi, www.panamas.biz