The Bobble Hat! (A slight tongue in cheek view)
10th October 2018
The Bobble Hat! (A slight tongue in cheek view)
What is this? There are so many other practical hats to wear when it is cold and wet, from Beanies to Trapper hats. So why add a bobble to a hat when they serve no purpose when out in the outdoors? What is it for then? Is it simply a folly, a superfluous adornment, a white elephant accessory, redundant and extraneous? Purely an aesthetic addition?
It is clear the bobble doesn't serves any practical purpose, therefore it is a stylised attachment, to what would otherwise be a vital piece of clothing for use in inclement weather. It is, however, in my view a potent symbol of how the outdoor fashion market perceives the ‘outdoors’. The great outdoors is now the designers and retailers ‘catwalk and shop front alfresco’.
To me this is deeply worrying. By adding aesthetic adornments to fundamental outdoor/adventure clothing it helps develop a ‘mind set’ that inevitably and subtly, redirects our understanding and ultimate interaction with our world. We start to want clothes for their form and not for their function. We start to view the outdoors as a lifestyle image rather than a lifestyle pursuit. We too easily talk the talk without having to walk the walk, even though we look like we did.
The tacit marketing message contained within the twist and weaves of the bobble is, “you need a bobble on your hat to safely get out into the outdoors, but also there a required look. This look must be achieved to ensure not only you are safe, but also because it expresses your inner spirit and qualities. Though once worn when you were a kid , the bobble now makes you a member of a particular wonderful group of the human race.
The bobble, worn in its kaleidoscope of colours. is seen as an outward expression of your qualifications as an outdoorsy person. You need the extraneous bobble as it is part of the overal required look, demonstrating your tribal adventurer eligibility.
If you dare to abstain from the bobble you have the worry of being shuffled to the bottom of the failed ‘outdoor’ human heap as it means you are not a true adventurer. You clearly do not climb mountains and know the outdoors. You know it is essential to look good, even in the outdoors.
A stiff walk up a hill, the heady balancing skill demonstrated as you cross a thin arête, or the traipse across a wild, wet moorland is only possible with the bobble and all its additional sartorial companions. The latest red, 3 layer gortex pro shell, soft shell, baselayer and Lycra/Merino fusion socks all with a matching pink flash on each zip tag, or superfluous sleeve flash are essential. These are features designed to ensure you have the ability and credentials to venture beyond the car, office and bar.
Meanwhile do not forget, encapsulated within the fluffy ball, however jaunty the angle it settles, it portrays you as a clean living, healthy,alpha male and woman. You are both cool, and you both like dogs and dig the environment and can be found on cold evenings snuggling kittens.
However, some where, hidden in the stitching that attached the bobble, is a hat, that keeps your head warm when cold and wet. Below this unnecessary ball of fibres is a wild, beautiful outdoor world, full of amazing flora, fauna and unbelievable landscape architecture. Beyond the designer labels is a very fragile landscape that is slowly eroding under the pressure of the unseeing eye of its users. Maybe blinkered by an eclipsing bobble.
A myopia hides in its shadow the real world, but focuses on the need to follow a lifestyle, where young bearded men, laugh and smile, looking strong and happy; while long haired ladies peer into the misty distance with what looks like a philosophers sight. You exits in a world where the backdrop is warm and in soft focus. You and your loving, wonderful companions are young, happy and definitely ‘where it's at’. You are empowered, enriched and reinvented by the power of the bobble hat.
What is this? There are so many other practical hats to wear when it is cold and wet, from Beanies to Trapper hats. So why add a bobble to a hat when they serve no purpose when out in the outdoors? What is it for then? Is it simply a folly, a superfluous adornment, a white elephant accessory, redundant and extraneous? Purely an aesthetic addition?
It is clear the bobble doesn't serves any practical purpose, therefore it is a stylised attachment, to what would otherwise be a vital piece of clothing for use in inclement weather. It is, however, in my view a potent symbol of how the outdoor fashion market perceives the ‘outdoors’. The great outdoors is now the designers and retailers ‘catwalk and shop front alfresco’.
To me this is deeply worrying. By adding aesthetic adornments to fundamental outdoor/adventure clothing it helps develop a ‘mind set’ that inevitably and subtly, redirects our understanding and ultimate interaction with our world. We start to want clothes for their form and not for their function. We start to view the outdoors as a lifestyle image rather than a lifestyle pursuit. We too easily talk the talk without having to walk the walk, even though we look like we did.
The tacit marketing message contained within the twist and weaves of the bobble is, “you need a bobble on your hat to safely get out into the outdoors, but also there a required look. This look must be achieved to ensure not only you are safe, but also because it expresses your inner spirit and qualities. Though once worn when you were a kid , the bobble now makes you a member of a particular wonderful group of the human race.
The bobble, worn in its kaleidoscope of colours. is seen as an outward expression of your qualifications as an outdoorsy person. You need the extraneous bobble as it is part of the overal required look, demonstrating your tribal adventurer eligibility.
If you dare to abstain from the bobble you have the worry of being shuffled to the bottom of the failed ‘outdoor’ human heap as it means you are not a true adventurer. You clearly do not climb mountains and know the outdoors. You know it is essential to look good, even in the outdoors.
A stiff walk up a hill, the heady balancing skill demonstrated as you cross a thin arête, or the traipse across a wild, wet moorland is only possible with the bobble and all its additional sartorial companions. The latest red, 3 layer gortex pro shell, soft shell, baselayer and Lycra/Merino fusion socks all with a matching pink flash on each zip tag, or superfluous sleeve flash are essential. These are features designed to ensure you have the ability and credentials to venture beyond the car, office and bar.
Meanwhile do not forget, encapsulated within the fluffy ball, however jaunty the angle it settles, it portrays you as a clean living, healthy,alpha male and woman. You are both cool, and you both like dogs and dig the environment and can be found on cold evenings snuggling kittens.
However, some where, hidden in the stitching that attached the bobble, is a hat, that keeps your head warm when cold and wet. Below this unnecessary ball of fibres is a wild, beautiful outdoor world, full of amazing flora, fauna and unbelievable landscape architecture. Beyond the designer labels is a very fragile landscape that is slowly eroding under the pressure of the unseeing eye of its users. Maybe blinkered by an eclipsing bobble.
A myopia hides in its shadow the real world, but focuses on the need to follow a lifestyle, where young bearded men, laugh and smile, looking strong and happy; while long haired ladies peer into the misty distance with what looks like a philosophers sight. You exits in a world where the backdrop is warm and in soft focus. You and your loving, wonderful companions are young, happy and definitely ‘where it's at’. You are empowered, enriched and reinvented by the power of the bobble hat.