By James Shackell –
The year was 2007. Apple had just announced the iPhone. Timbaland and Sean Kingston were enjoying their 15 minutes. And grey fedoras were considered cool.
If you were born in a year starting with a “2”, it might be hard to imagine a world where fedoras didn’t make you look like the sort of guy who regularly mimes taking out earbuds. But that world did exist – it was called the noughties.
Nowadays, grey fedoras are a really efficient identifier of people you’ll regret sitting next to on public transport. It’s hard to imagine a more universally hated fashion accessory. But the early 2000s represented what Vice called the “fedora renaissance”, which I guess makes me a renaissance man. I wore a grey fedora, unironically and in public, for about three years. Me and some other people, like Pete Doherty and Johnny Depp (which, I realise as I write this, probably isn’t the most ringing celebrity endorsement).
Now, on its own, a grey fedora in the noughties isn’t the worst fashion crime imaginable. As I said, lots of people were inflicting fedoras on the general public back then. But for some reason I decided, as I awkwardly moved into my formative early 20s, that the ‘look’ I was going to ‘rock’ would be a grey fedora and a goatee. I know. I know. You can practically smell the Lynx Africa.
See, I’d spent most of my teenage years actively trying to disappear. And I thought visibility. In short, I overcompensated. For a few years, every Saturday night, I’d head out with a freshly shaved goatee and a grey fedora, ready to experience whatever the world had to offer. It mostly offered loneliness.
