Hats!

I have always liked women in hats. From my mom's friend Laura down to J-Lo, there's just something about them that gets my motor going. I remember in High School this girl named Cheri started wearing a hat, I guess it was a porkpie hat, and there was something irresistable-ish and untouchable at the same time. I've been thinking about it a lot and I've come up with a theory. Let's start with Casablanca,where Ingrid Bergman wears so many lovely hats over the course of the movie. I've always been particularly taken with this one:

I couldn't figure it out before, but look at it now, how it encloses and defines her facial space, gives a powerful downward sweep to her glance. It embodies the strength she uses here to shut Bogey out, to pay Rick back for being such an ass. Tonight, though, she will come back to his place, prepared to shoot him, but she doesn't. Instead, she melts in his arms and asks that he think for both of them. Of course, in that scene, she isn't wearing a hat. I think hats in old movies accentuated the strong-but-yielding character of a woman, the woman who is soft, but not weak, feminine but not stupid or vain. We know Ilsa will have the courage to get on that plane because of her hat

See how it makes her equal to him. He throws down the challenge of what she must do, and she accepts, although not without an arousingly feminine show of emotion.

I think this is part of why women's hats have gone somewhat out of fashion. With the strides feminism has made, they're attacked on both sides. From an antifeminist perspective, strong women are too threatening these days, so the parity given women by hats is discouraged. From the feminist perspective, the implicit softness under the hat is disparaged.

Or maybe I'm just rationalizing, but the dominatrix quality of my teaser image, I think, can't be denied.

Hats can also add mystery to a woman, which, as you know is my favorite thing. As the inimitable Bergman in Notorious
Again, how masculine. Her entire dress here alludes to masculinity without becoming androgynous. Beautiful, seductive, and strong despite her predicament.

But they don't always have to be masculine to be strong. Sometimes the power is in the mystery.

And sometimes it's in playfulness.

And, of course, the right hat can make anyone look good: