The “treasury”, as some employees call it, is hidden behind an inconspicuous door: a collection of hats that you won’t find in the best fashion store. There are around 15,000 hats from different decades on the shelves, numbered to help you find them more quickly. Wide-brimmed hats here, narrow-brimmed there; leisure caps next to fine melons; Caps made of fine cloth, felt or so extravagant that there is a good chance of attracting attention – such as the grass-green hat with football decorations attached, including the goal and playing field.
The room of a thousand hats is the archive of the hat manufacturer Mayser from Lindenberg (Lindau district) – and testimony to the sometimes strange directions that Bavarian companies had to take in order to survive times of crisis. Little is left of the proud tradition of hats in Lindenberg, once dubbed the “little Paris of hats”. In the village itself only Mayser remained as the last manufacturer. And only because he now earns his money mainly with deformation and safety technology.
The boss is located in downtown Munich
Part of the change in Lindenberg is that the boss is often 170 kilometers away by car, in downtown Munich in the Zechbauer building. Hats hang in the basement, tobacco products are on display on the ground floor, and the offices are above. As a representative of the seventh family generation, Michael Zechbauer also works in real estate and produces films. As a co-partner of the Mayser company, he says he stays out of their day-to-day business, which does not mean that he only works in the background: he lends the name and face to a hat line.
Even today, making hats by hand is a must: Despite all the technical advances, the work still looks the same as it did 150 years ago.
(Photo: private)
Mayser sold around 150,000 pieces of headgear last year, which was shaped by Corona. According to the online shop, the price ranges from just under 40 euros for a headband in a floral look to 260 euros for a Panama hat. “We’re right in the middle,” says Zechbauer: between the small studios with some high-quality one-off productions and the companies “which, I would say maliciously, work things together in Bangladesh.” Seen in this way, the company was already in other spheres in terms of numbers in 1963, at that time it was producing three and a half million hats. In retrospect, this record year can be seen as the last rebellion of the Lindenberg hat industry, before it gradually dwindled away because fashion became hatless and lower labor costs abroad lured. The art of weaving straw hats has a long tradition in the Allgäu. Trade with it can be documented up to the middle of the 16th century. In 1890, 34 manufacturers with a total of eight million straw hats concentrated in Lindenberg.
Once a year, Lindenberg celebrates Hat Day
This is what is remembered in the city above all. Once a year it celebrates Hat Day with a hat market and hat fashion show, and the SPD awards the “socialist hat”. The German Hat Museum, set up in a former hat factory, shows the local hat history. And then there is the Mayser company site, just a few steps from the museum. Founded in Ulm in 1800, the “Hutmacherey” was at times one of the largest stock corporations in the country. In 1929, the takeover of the Milz straw hat factory was followed by relocation to the Allgäu. In 1940, son-in-law Curt M. Zechbauer, Michael Zechbauer’s grandfather, took over.
Michael Zechbauer, who runs the company in the 7th generation, wants to keep the branch going.
(Photo: Maximilian Gerl)
Despite the change, there are still a few hat companies in Bavaria; in nearby Weiler-Simmerberg, for example, the Seeberger brand has survived. In contrast, hats are no longer made in the hat mecca of Lindenberg itself. Zechbauer relocated their production to Slovakia a few years ago. “That couldn’t be avoided,” he says, given the difficult situation in the industry. Around 100 people now work at the Rožňava site. Because even today nothing works when making hats without manual work: Despite all the technical advances, it looks “like it did 150 years ago,” says Zechbauer.
According to the hat museum, depending on the hat, up to 70 work steps add up. A few are shown on video in the exhibition, and Mayser employees are also involved. To put it very simply, each model and each size needs a mold that is cast from aluminum – as well as a pillar in the right color and made of the desired material, such as felt, for each cap. Only the hatters bring both parts together by putting the blank over the mold and pulling it to fit. With straw hats, on the other hand, things are quite different: they still have to be braided to ensure high quality. “Drodeln” is what it’s called in the Allgäu.
The hat designs are still created at the Mayser headquarters in Lindenberg. Twelve people work here in design and sales. In the studio, sewing utensils are scattered in creative chaos, the current collection hangs on the walls and the future collection can be seen on display boards. Wooden models are waiting on the shelves in the room next door. There are also several hat devices, from the small sewing machine to the large press, which uses hot steam to shape cheroots. Because every machine in the Slovakian plant has its counterpart in Lindenberg: on the one hand, the milliners can turn their ideas into prototypes and, on the other hand, they can test the parameters under which production will succeed later.
According to Mayser, hat sales have recently picked up again – and despite all the effort involved, it does not contribute much to the total sales, which are heading for 60 million euros. Because when more and more hat companies got into trouble at the end of the 1960s, something new was needed. Mayser was familiar with deformation technology and had also experimented with foam. In retrospect, Zechbauer compares the company to “a craft shop that has tried out all areas” until it finally ended up in the automotive sector, today’s strongest product segment. These include miniature safety strips, which are installed in the trunk as anti-trap protection, for example, or foam materials for the interior paneling.
Do hats that are only partly made in Lindenberg still correspond to the Lindenberg tradition? Or, conversely, does it only exist because it is different today, adapted to the needs of the time? Hat making is an “incredibly great craft,” says Zechbauer. He wanted to keep it, in a way also for the sake of the family history. “In the seventh generation, I would find it antisocial if I took everything that was good and nice with me and threw the strenuous overboard.” The hat division at Mayser should therefore live on – even if the great hat days may never return.