Holly Johnson taught herself to make hats using videos on the internet<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n
“The dream is to put a hat on Beyonce.”<\/p>\n
Holly Johnson has been making felt hats from scratch since just before the pandemic – and in that time they have gone from being bought by friends, to being sold worldwide.<\/p>\n
Some look like mushrooms, some are moulded to look like skulls – and the results can get bought by Las Vegas magicians or for dogs who appear in films.<\/p>\n
“It’s really special, sending them off and knowing that they’re just gonna be worn in a completely different culture in a different part of the world,” the 30-year-old said.<\/p>\n
“I’ve had so much shock when I’ll open my website sometimes and it’s like Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Germany, Italy, there’s been Turkey, Morocco.<\/p>\n
“I just get to kind of think, I wonder what they’re doing – who’s wearing it, what are they doing in that hat?”<\/p>\n Her hat business started to take off during the pandemic<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n Internet videos played a key role in helping the self-taught hat-maker to learn her craft.<\/p>\n “I never planned to become a hat-maker, I think I’ve always liked dressing up and making costumes and stuff like that,” Johnson said.<\/p>\n “It started when I made a big cardboard hat for a friend for a birthday.<\/p>\n “Then I kind of went into foam hats and cutting foam, hot gluing it together, and they were very messy.<\/p>\n “Then I just Googled it one day. I had no idea, I’d never heard of hat-making. I just kind of watched lots of videos. “<\/p>\n After a lot of trial and error, figuring out her own techniques, she said she started really getting into it when she was furloughed during the pandemic, doing it every day.<\/p>\n The business, HoJo Hattery, began in her and her partner’s spare room – “stinking the house out” – before branching out to her current location in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire.<\/p>\n “There’s so much hat-making heritage here,” Johnson said. “Newcastle-under-lyme was known for [it] in the 17th and 18th Centuries.”<\/p>\n She now works out of Newcastle-under-Lyme, in part because of the town’s history with hat-making<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n Among her recent commissions was making the trophies for the Music Awards of Staffordshire and Cheshire in January – mini top hats, modelled on the famous one worn by rock guitarist and Stoke-on-Trent old boy Slash, of Guns N’ Roses.<\/p>\n “We wanted little versions of those as a nod to the music industry in Stoke,” the hat-maker said.<\/p>\n “The hats are completely made how I make my normal hats.<\/p>\n “Every single little step, all of the little sewing details, inner sweatbands, all the embellishments and everything.”<\/p>\n She made the trophies for the recent Music Awards of Staffordshire and Cheshire – featuring mini top hats modeled after the one worn by Slash, from Guns N’ Roses<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n With thousands following her on social media including 9,000 on Instagram, her audience is truly global and Johnson said that had led to some special commissions.<\/p>\n “One guy was from Las Vegas, a magician and he wanted like a skull-crown fedora hat then it had little buckles inside, so that he could attach things to do magic tricks with,” she said.<\/p>\n She also once made “a bicorn hat for a dog that was in the new Napoleon film”.<\/p>\n “The dog did not wear the hat in the film, but he did wear it for photoshoots after, which was really funny.”<\/p>\n Holly Johnson admits she is still shocked to find out people from countries such as Morocco, Germany and Iceland want her hats<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n America is where most of her sales are now, nearly three-quarters – “maybe they just love hats more over there” – but she has one ambition she wants to achieve.<\/p>\n “I always used to joke years ago that the dream is to put a hat on Beyonce,” the 30-year-old admitted.<\/p>\n While she waits for the phone call or a slide into her DMs from Queen Bey, Johnson said she would always look to get as creative as she could when it came to making hats.<\/p>\n “I’d love to find a market where I can really kind of push the boundaries, get a bit wild, make really, really huge hats or really like weird creative shapes,” she grinned.<\/p>\n “I guess the dream is just any celebrity [to wear them] – I’ll take any celebrity.”<\/p>\n Follow BBC Stoke & Staffordshire on <\/em>BBC Sounds<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>Facebook<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>X<\/em><\/a> and <\/em>Instagram<\/em><\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>
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