Annika ~ Black Lace

Garbo-inspired high crown hat in black lace over a tulle wrapped wire frame.

• Materials: Floral Lace, Chantilly Lace, Fishnet Embroidered Net, Tulle, Millinery Wire, Stretch Velvet Ribbon
• Style: High Crown
• Attachment: Small Metal Combs
• Measurements: 10 in high from center front (25 cm)
• Hat Box: 
• How to Wear: Worn tilted slightly to the right and back of the head

Ready to ship. lnside measurement is 21.5" (55 cm) but will fit XS-S-M as it secures with two small combs on each side.

Annika was created for a themed installation at The Gallery at The Met Museum Store. The display was the culmination of a research project and international millinery competition hosted by the Milliners Guild. In honor of Mildred Blount's legacy, the MG 2024 competition challenge was to create a fashion-forward hat inspired by an iconic film costume of the 1930s, 40s or 50s.

Artist Statement: 

In the 1939 romantic comedy Ninotchka, there is a hat, first seen in a Paris shop window, that embodies the frivolity and decadence of capitalism and then a transformation for lead character Nina Ivanovna Yakushova. Nina, portrayed by Greta Garbo, is a resolute and dignified envoy from Moscow, fully committed to communist ideology. Upon seeing the whimsical felt hat, she exclaims: “How can such a civilization survive which permits women to put things like that on their heads? It won’t be long now, comrades!” 

After falling in love with Count Leon d’Algout (Melvyn Douglas), Nina buys the hat. It symbolizes a softening of her ideals, though not necessarily a full embrace of fashion and consumerism. Nina is joyful. She laughs! The original hat features a high crown and is hand-stitched: utilitarian in construction albeit avant-garde in silhouette. Using that eccentric shape as inspiration, I created a version that is light and elegant, combining two vintage black laces with a modern floral lace, all carefully stretched and sewn over a tulle-wrapped millinery wire frame.

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Each Milli Starr hat is meticulously shaped and sewn by hand in my studio in Austin, Texas.