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An authoritative guide to the many uses one can make of a traditional Welsh hat: 101 to be precise. Though number 34 is questionable, number 64 is probably illegal and number 81 should not be attempted without a medical professional on standby. -- Cyngor Llyfrau Cymru

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9781914303210

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The website, Welsh Costume, notes that there is no clear indication of how or why the distinctive Welsh hat, with its tall, straight-sided or conical crown and broad stiff brim, began to be worn by rural Welsh women during the 1830s. It may well owe its origins to the Puritans and Quaker costume of the seventeenth century. Lady Llanover certainly popularised the Welsh costume with her early watercolours from 1834, after winning a prize at the Cardiff Eisteddfod for her essay on ‘The advantages resulting from the preservation of the Welsh language and national costume of Wales’, published in 1836. The iconic painting, Salem, by Sydney Curnow Vosper, depicting a scene in a Baptist chapel in Meirionnydd, further enhanced the national costume with its depiction of the central character, Siân Owen, and the contentious belief that the devil is depicted in the sleeve of her shawl! Modern artists such as Ruth Jên of Tal-y-bont, Ceredigion have continued to popularise the theme, with her humorous and highly original take on the Welsh ‘Ledis’ producing a plethora of original works, prints, greeting cards and calendars. Another of our talented Welsh illustrators, and the author of this book, Huw Aaron, again with tongue in cheek, notes that for countless generations, every St. David’s Day, Welsh school children don tall black hats in honour of their patron saint. And in a series of 101 amusing cartoons, Aaron offers us suggestions of various alternative uses which can be made of the hats for the remaining 364 days of the year! Without spoiling the joy these cartoons will bring to the reader, I will cite only two of my favourites from this collection. I particularly liked the adaptation of the hat as a rocket-head nozzle which NASA could utilise in their space programmes. Secondly, the adaptation of several hats as roadside cones provides a more realistic option. Cones are normally orange in colour but I have seen local undertakers using black and white cones to restrict parking during funeral services. Maybe there is a real possibility here of redesigning their cones to a more traditional theme! My late art master at grammar school, Ken Etheridge, is credited with writing the standard work, Welsh Costume, the first edition of which was published in 1958. It has subsequently been republished in many editions. I was blissfully unaware of his achievement until many years later when I began to work at the National Library of Wales. A modest and shy man, I’m sure ‘Ethi Bach', as we knew him, would approve of this new work and would find it as amusing as I did. As a talented artist himself, he would also appreciate the skills of this cartoonist, whose work regularly features in Private Eye. -- Richard E. Huws @ www.gwales.com

The website, Welsh Costume, notes that there is no clear indication of how or why the distinctive Welsh hat, with its tall, straight-sided or conical crown and broad stiff brim, began to be worn by rural Welsh women during the 1830s. It may well owe its origins to the Puritans and Quaker costume of the seventeenth century. Lady Llanover certainly popularised the Welsh costume with her early watercolours from 1834, after winning a prize at the Cardiff Eisteddfod for her essay on 'The advantages resulting from the preservation of the Welsh language and national costume of Wales', published in 1836. The iconic painting, Salem, by Sydney Curnow Vosper, depicting a scene in a Baptist chapel in Meirionnydd, further enhanced the national costume with its depiction of the central character, Sian Owen, and the contentious belief that the devil is depicted in the sleeve of her shawl! Modern artists such as Ruth Jen of Tal-y-bont, Ceredigion have continued to popularise the theme, with her humorous and highly original take on the Welsh 'Ledis' producing a plethora of original works, prints, greeting cards and calendars. Another of our talented Welsh illustrators, and the author of this book, Huw Aaron, again with tongue in cheek, notes that for countless generations, every St. David's Day, Welsh school children don tall black hats in honour of their patron saint. And in a series of 101 amusing cartoons, Aaron offers us suggestions of various alternative uses which can be made of the hats for the remaining 364 days of the year! Without spoiling the joy these cartoons will bring to the reader, I will cite only two of my favourites from this collection. I particularly liked the adaptation of the hat as a rocket-head nozzle which NASA could utilise in their space programmes. Secondly, the adaptation of several hats as roadside cones provides a more realistic option. Cones are normally orange in colour but I have seen local undertakers using black and white cones to restrict parking during funeral services. Maybe there is a real possibility here of redesigning their cones to a more traditional theme! My late art master at grammar school, Ken Etheridge, is credited with writing the standard work, Welsh Costume, the first edition of which was published in 1958. It has subsequently been republished in many editions. I was blissfully unaware of his achievement until many years later when I began to work at the National Library of Wales. A modest and shy man, I'm sure 'Ethi Bach', as we knew him, would approve of this new work and would find it as amusing as I did. As a talented artist himself, he would also appreciate the skills of this cartoonist, whose work regularly features in Private Eye. -- Richard E. Huws @ www.gwales.com

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