Cappelleria Melegari is mainly a hat shop. Why am I writing about it? Well, it’s just one of the many characteristic shops which you can find in Italy, where chain store uniformity has yet to take hold.
The Milan hat shop is an example of just how wonderful Italy’s shops can be. Cappelleria Melegari sells far more than just hats: you can find shirts, including my favourite granddad shirts, jackets, women’s wear and children’s clothing, not to mention other winter gear such as gloves and scarves. Summer wear is, logically, available from Cappelleria Melegari during the summer months. Stock is suitably seasonal.
Prices are not low, but quality is high. It does not restrict itself to Italian clothing and accessories either, you will find stuff from the UK, Ireland and even Australia, plus a few other places. Then there are the hats. Lots and lots of them.
I like hats and I bought a wonderful, for me anyway, leather Australian riding hat from Melegari some time ago. This hat is brown, waterproof and very practical, allowing me to do away with a cumbersome umbrella. However, Melegari does not just sell Australian riding hats, it sells a whole range of head toppers: from top hats to simple woolly things. My other half bought a simple cashmere number for 35 Euros there yesterday. The range of hats is stunning and it would be a dangerous place for a hat-a-holic, I’m sure.
While the shop itself appears to be quite small, it is a bit of an Aladdin’s cave and there are plenty of treasures to be uncovered on its three floors.
Stop reading, start speaking
Stop translating in your head and start speaking Italian for real with the only audio course that prompt you to speak.
On the ground floor, where you pay, there is a range of sweaters, shirts, jackets and too many other things to mention. next there is the first floor, which has no window and is smaller than the ground. Here you will find ladies clothing and children’s’ wear, with one or two other things mixed in for good measure. Browsing is just about possible and the staff are not too intrusive, especially when they are busy, which gives you more time to have a look around.
Hats on top!
Finally, there is my favourite second and last floor, where you will see all the hats. The variety is bewildering. They are stacked everywhere. At the time of writing, Milan was in a winter phase, but come summer and out will come the snappy Panama hats.
There are big mirrors in situated useful places so you can gaze at your hat wearing self before plumping down your cash, which, incidentally, you can only do after a helpful assistant gives you a little ticket with a price on. You then take the ticket to the till on the ground floor, pay, and walk away.
Visiting this shop is quite an experience, I think. Cappelleria Melegari even has a website here, be sure and have a look at the ‘catalogo’. In the men’s section you can even find a ‘Fidel’ style cap. Just the thing for when you are feeling a bit revolutionary, red and dictatorial!!
If you are feeling adventurous, why not have a look at an ‘Indiana’? Oddly enough there seems to be more hat wear for male heads than for female ones, but I guess that is just because lots of hats can be worn by both sexes.
My hat goes off to this great shop.
