Watch as this traditional felt Top Hat is meticulously handcrafted the old fashioned way 🎩 

Yeah, good work and craftmanship indeed. SALUTE

Yeah, very nice indeed. SALUTE

Pre-Collapsible era? You mean before the 1830s, when it was invented by paris hatmaker Gibus? The most images of top hats or castor hats from the 19. century I know shows hats made of felt, mostly beaver felt, or silk and satin for a very formal top hat. I never heard of pelt and cardboard top hats, would not that made them very delicate to wear, especially in damp weather?

Never heard of a pelt covered Top hat however, calico top hats were most commonly produced in that era which were buckram frames covered in a material made from silk called hatters plush. It resembles the long hair of the melusine beaver hat bodies used in felt hat making. These are the shiny top hats you see from that era. One reason you don't see modern hatters making these is because the plush material is no longer in production anywhere in the world.

@Threedog92 yes. They are absurdly delicate. The rain must have been hazardous. That's why collapsible came along, the simple fabric hats eith no hard structure. Just hunger struts that.could bend. Collapse to flatten the hat for storage. Think of Shirley McClain doing If M Friends Could See Me Now from Sweet Charity . She pops the hat in and out. Before that toppers were very easily destroyed