How to clean my fedora?

[TheVez2]

Gents,
i just picked up this fedora at a garage sale. It is a Christys London fedora, made in the USA. As best as I can tell it is fur felt. It is very soft and kind of floppy. I paid $5 for it. She said she'd take less when I asked about the price, but I saw no point in asking less. Best as I can find on the interwebs, it's a $200 hat.

Being a used hat, how do I clean and sterilize it?

 

[Mick]

Bleach, followed by soaking in boiling water, followed by alcohol, followed by barbicide...

Oh wait. Hat right?

I never do anything but I try to buy only hats used that look like they were gifted and never worn.

Some say putting it in a freezer for a few days will kill any insect larvae.

If you are really worried about it see if you can find someone locally who deals in hats who can clean it professionally.

Personally I'd say stick it on your head and if your hair does not fall out in a few days you win

Nice hat BTW

 

[Mick]

If you can't find anyone locally I came up with this from a hat forum. Highly recommended by several members on there

http://optimohats.com/#/hat_services/

 

[TheVez2]

Thanks, I'm not looking to put a bunch of money into it. I might try the freezer thing, then hit the sweatband with some steam. Unless anyone has any better ideas. I'm not terribly worried about bugs and germs. Mainly concerned with sweat and dirt inside that may smell as I'm wearing it.

 

[jkingrph]

I learned over on the fedoralounge.com forum to clean hats in naphtha ( white gas, aka Coleman fuel) It works great. I got nice but dirty Stetson Open Road off ebay and got a big container and enough Coleman fuel to submerge the hat, I turned the sweatband out to keep the fuel off of it as much as possible, then soaked it for a few hours then in and out a few times to make the fuel flow through the felt, then held up for a few minutes to drain, let dry and adjusted shape. I looked as good as some I had sent to a professional hatter and paid around $50 for cleaning. The naphtha will remove old oils, and by its action will kill most bacteria ( removes the fatty acids in the bacterial cell required for metabolizem) It probably would not be considered 100% sterile, which would require steam under pressure or special gasses under pressure, but it will be clean enough. The freezer trick would probably only work on things like moth larvae.

 

[Clanmac]

A very soft felt brush and lots of steam, if it goes out of shape , reshape it whilst damp and dry with a hair dryer...

If it has a material headband or leather think you can clean with an antibacterial hand wash, just don't get it wet or it will shrink.

Looks a nice hat.

 

[Topgumby]

I learned over on the fedoralounge.com forum to clean hats in naphtha ( white gas, aka Coleman fuel) It works great...

Spot on.

Or, should I say, spot off. That's the way to get the gunge out.

 

[mark the shoeshine boy]

we need to know what size your hat is...because if it a 7 1/2 it is not possible to clean it at all....and i will pay you what you have in it and shipping....i would hate to see a fellow BB waste his money....


LOL


the white gas is the trick....google hat brushes and you will get an idea of what one looks like....i brush mine off about every couple of weeks (because i have the brush next to my hats)....if the hat has been worn a bunch then the sweatband maybe a little salty, this is a tricky part...use a little leather balm, but wipe it completely clean or you will be wearing the leather balm.....