What Else? #4 Estate LA

Sep 18, 2011 by Pyrophilly    No Comments    Posted under: Fitteds

The New Era Cap Company plays a huge roll in the fitted cap market. Being the exclusive manufacturer of the official on-field cap worn by every Major League Baseball team is one of the main reasons for this. I do wonder if people are aware of the alternatives available when looking for a fitted cap. Nowadays there are plenty of brands producing top quality fitted caps. In a series of posts I will try to encourage fitted enthusiasts to look further than what they’re familiar with, by showing one alternative at a time.

Edit: unfortunately my feelings about the silence of the brand were right, a trustworthy source confirms the passing of Estate LA, consider this a tribute

In What Else? #4 we take a look at Estate LA. If Im correct the brand started back in 2006 and has a focus on headwear only, mainly fitted hats and snapbacks. The brand takes pride in crafting every piece by hand in the city of Angels. With multiple pieces for reference we can get a good view of the style, quality and fit of Estate LA fitted caps.

Style
What is already visible from the selected pieces below is the variety of materials used. Below we can find; tweed, suede, canvas & cotton but the brand has used about every material you can think of throughout their line. A big plus in my opinion. Variety is also what can be seen in the design of each piece, the blackness on the madras type design is a twist turning ordinary into extraordinary in a subtle way.

Quality
The quality of 3D stitching as can be seen below in the first two pictures is always on point. When taking a closer look at the eyelets on each panel you can sometimes see that the hats are made by hand. Although this might not always be as tight as a machine made piece, this gives each hat its charm. The inside of most pieces is on point as well, the tweed piece below comes extra nice with perfectly executed black satin lining.

Fit
In my experience the fit of Estate LA hats is slightly tighter than your average NE. Sizing up shouldn’t be a problem if you would like to maintain the way you always wear your fitteds. The fit is also a little less deep as I would like them to be. This might be an issue that only pops up at the bigger sizes (im a 3/4) so it might be smaller sizes dont have this issue at all.

All in all I’m a big fan of what Estate LA is doing, creativity in design & styles combined with good manufacturing. I must admit that it has been quiet around the brand lately, the website www.estatela.com is no longer online and the last news dates from earlier this year. Dont let this be over…

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