Column: Pharrell pulls off the Mountain hat

Let’s discuss the elephant in the room.

OK, it’s not an elephant. But as we’ve all heard, the Vivienne Westwood hat Pharrell Williams rocked at the Grammy Awards was just as big as one.
 
Williams won Producer of the Year, Nonclassical, at this year’s 56th Grammy Awards. But, according to the Internet, his hat was the most memorable part of his appearance.

The day after the hat meme explosion, I tweeted IU graduate turned big-shot Condé Nast News Editor, Mickey Woods for his comments on the pick.

He replied, “Pharrell pulls off most things because he’s so damn suave.”

Shockingly, I agree, and here’s six reasons you should too.

No blackmail, trances or Potter Befuddlement potions used.

Pharrell didn’t even have a stylist who might have chosen his hat as a publicity stunt.
The hat was a free will choice.

Pharrell told the 56th Grammy Wrap-Up Show hosts fashion is supposed to be DIY.
Pairing what he coined the “Buffalo” hat with a classic adidas jacket, an i am OTHER t-shirt and a Chanel necklace, Pharrell did just that.

He said it’s time to celebrate individuality and we’re going to see that in music this year.

The star also predicted a return to a genuine interest in real musicianship, referencing artists like Blondie and Donna Summer — it’s only ironic that the ’70 artists were from the same era as his hat.

Despite that, I respect a man that makes his own decisions. Hat’s got history. It’s vintage. This isn’t the hat’s first celebrity appearance.

It’s quite vintage, making its first debut in Malcolm McLaren’s 1983 video “Buffalo Gals.”

As former manager of English punk rock band Sex Pistols, McLaren has a musical background, as well as one in the fashion design world with punk marvel Vivienne Westwood, who actually designed the mountain hat.

Pharrell said he liked the history and simply liked the hat.

The best part is, it’s the exact same hat McLaren wore. Now, that’s creditable.
Hat is going places.

Though the hat might be vintage vogue, similar designs are emerging.

Pharrell said music, architecture and fashion are going their own way.

Looking at Vivienne Westwood’s Spring/Summer 2014 collections, we find similar statements are considered au courant.

In her Red Label, we see her World’s End hat in natural colored straw as well as many prop hats in her Gold Label runway.

We also see a slightly more urban style hat with the name Climate Revolution.

This would better fit Pharrell’s sense of style, but we wouldn’t be talking about him if he didn’t go buffalo-style.
 
It’s not part of his own Billionaire Boys Club and Ice Cream Collection.

The Mountain hat is more hip, in my opinion, than anything we see in Pharrell’s own line Billionaire Boys Club and Ice Cream.

Launched in 2005 with Japanese designer Nigo and Pharrell’s manager Robert Walker, the line is what I’ll describe as an amateur attempt by some college freshman with a graphic press.

Maybe not that terrible, but I wouldn’t consider it stylized. I prefer Pharrell in something a bit more mature.

The mountain hat is about 30 years more mature. It’s Pharrell.

Pharrell told Grammy Wrap Up Show he’s just happy to be a little
punctuation in the sentence of cool things that happened that night at the award show.
I’d like to call him the exclamation mark, but he’d disagree. He’s not big-headed, just big-hatted.

Among all of the rapper/producer/designer’s achievements this year, he’s like the modest counterpart to the Kanye ego, which we all need in our lives.

He even played along with Arby’s breakthrough tweet, “Hey @Pharrell, can we get our hat back? #GRAMMYs.” “Y’all tryna start a roast beef?” he responsed.

Funny, Pharrell.

You can be a Mountie, too.

Lastly, there’s no reason to diss Pharrell because you can now become a Mountain man or woman yourself.

According to Vivienne’s Twitter account, there have been mountains of orders.

Oh, and it comes in black.

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Follow columnist Kel Collisi on Twitter @kelcollisi.