Identifing Beaver Felt

Glenville86

New member
I was wondering if you are having a hat made, buying from a store or pre-owned and it is advertised as beaver, how can you tell a beaver felt from a rabbit felt? Not talking the all the xxxx on hats. Just can you hold a 100% beaver felt and Rabbit felt and tell the difference?
 

Drones33

New member
Good question. I suppose the likes of David Morgan or John Penman could tell by look or feel, but it must take literally years of field work to build that kind of expertise. :)
 

Glenville86

New member
I ordered a couple 100% beaver felt hats from NorthWestHats that will come sometime in the future. Will be interesting to compare them with the rabbit felt ones I own.

Seriously doubt I will be able to tell though. ;)
 

Drones33

New member
I'll be very interested to hear, or rather read, your thoughts on them when they arrive; how they compare with rabbit in terms of feel, weight, texture etc :)
 

indyhan

New member
Glenville86 said:
I ordered a couple 100% beaver felt hats from NorthWestHats that will come sometime in the future. Will be interesting to compare them with the rabbit felt ones I own.

Seriously doubt I will be able to tell though. ;)

hey

i happen to have both rabbit and beaver felt by Northwest hats
the difference is, rabbit felt is a bit rougher (but i must say that rabbit felt they use at Nortwest hats is very nice), and a bit thicker than the beaver (i'm talking dress weight beaver,a s they also offer cowboy beaver felt, which is stiffer and thicker than the dress weight beaver)
they also now offer a portuguese thinner rabbit felt that appears to be as refined and as thin as their regular beaver felt (which i take it makes it even more difficult to tell from beaver felt, shessshh...)
i admit felt quality may be a litlle puzzling at times. As i mentionned, i have a northwest hat in rabbit felt that is supposed to be made of the same rabbit felt a garrison raiders hat i once had was made of, and the nortwest version of the said rabbit felt is way better in my opinion, funnily enough...:confused:

and as prices come, you can't really say, as the northwest hats are way cheaper than say Penman or adventurebilt and yet seem to be to last bit on par with those in terms of quality...
 
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