Hat Portrait Profile.29
Takashi Kumagai

People who really look good in hats might be stylish, aged adults.
The change in style and the mark of age are evident in the portraits wearing hats.
In the series "Portraits of Hats," portraits of hat masters emerge through two portrait photographs and a few short answers to five common questions.
This time we have Kumagai Takashi, a multifaceted stylist who recently revived his own brand, GDC.
What is the surprising reason why Kumagai started wearing a hat?
 

5 QUESTIONS TO
Takashi Kumagai  

Tell me about when you started wearing hats.

I've always worn hats a lot in my styling work. My editors would say to me, "You wear too many hats, don't you?" I started wearing hats in earnest when I was about 33 and had a shaved head. I started surfing around that time, and had dreadlocks. But my hair absorbed water and was heavy, so when I went to Hawaii, I shaved it all off (laughs). After I shaved my head and felt lonely, I started wearing hats. At first, I bought a lot of Borsalino, and then I started looking for western hats that would go with Native American jewelry.

 

Who would you like to wear a hat?

For me, it's (Ernest) Hemingway. I don't know if he wore a hat, but I have an image of him wearing a hat in a film like "The Old Man and the Sea." And then there's movies. Don Corleone in "The Godfather," and actors like River Phoenix, Brad Pitt, Johnny Depp, and Matt Dillon. I imitated Brad Pitt's dungaree shirt and western hat style in "Thelma & Louise," and I'm influenced by the styles in movies of people my age or a little older than me. Basically, I like people who look good in clothes.

 

Please tell me what you pay attention to when you wear a hat.

The way I wear my hat is always with the brim up. Foreigners who like hats often tell me to wear my hat like this, but I say, "Shut up, it's like this," and I put it up (laughs). People in gangster movies wear their hats down, but Matt Dillon and Brad Pitt wear them up, so I guess I was influenced by them. I also care a lot about sweat stains and smells. So I wipe my head frequently, and I used to spray it with something like mint.

 

Please tell me about the hat you are wearing today.

This is a COLLABORATION between CA4LA and GDC. When I went to CA4LA for a meeting, the model that the director Akimoto (Nobuhiro) was wearing matched my image perfectly, so I said, "I'd like this one." I usually buy my hats overseas. I like to have my head size measured properly at the store before I buy it. I currently have about 200 hats, and about 500 if you include other items. But before I started decluttering, I think I had about 1,000. (laughs) Hats take up a lot of space, so I always buy hat boxes overseas.

 

What does a hat mean to your life?

I guess it's just a part of my body. When I take my hat off, my head feels cold. I don't like taking my hat off at lunchtime at the golf course, and I don't like places where I'm told to take my hat off. I don't think I'll be wearing a wig in the future, so I think I'll keep wearing a hat for the rest of my life.