How to Get a Custom Hat Made by Hollywood's Best

John Wayne, Diane Keaton, slash Beyonce, Bob Dylan, all have one thing in common. They've all worn hats custom made by Baron Hats in downtown Los Angeles, Hollywood's hat maker for generations, whose old handwritten customer book includes names like Frank Sinatra, Jimmy Stewart, the cast of Bonanza, and many, many more. And there's John. Seven and three eighths. And the story of this legendary company continues to this very day. We did the fitting at Paramount, yeah. Variety reported how the costumer for 2023's Oppenheimer movie searched the world for just the right fedora for its Oscar-winning star, Cillian Murphy, and found it at Baron Hats, whose owner, Mark Mejia, delivered it to the set. Christopher Nolan was there and I was there and Cillian Murphy was there and we knocked it out of the park, I think. All in a day's work for Mark. This is a braiding machine. We're making braid for different types of caps. It's going to go in the front of the trim. It's going to go in the front of the cap. Who often makes personal visits to fit and deliver hats to movie studios, sets, and even the personal homes of the biggest names in Hollywood. Oh yeah, it's interesting. I mean, I don't get starstruck, you know, necessarily. This is just my perfect fit for me. I've been blessed with that, being able around these, being at their house, actually at their home, you know. So it's pretty unique, you know, in some of the places that I've been. Founder Eddie Baron used to personally deliver hats to John Wayne. And he would go to his house and actually do a fitting there. And he told, that was some of the stories that he told me when he made hats for John Wayne. A native of Columbia, Eddie got his start at Western Costume in Los Angeles before founding Baron Hats and Burbank in the 1960s. Eddie Baron worked on hundreds and hundreds of commercials and motion pictures and television. The Rifleman, he did a lot of work on lots of Westerns well before my time. And that was one of his specialties, was Western hats. It's shaping and forming and creating a size and a shape. Mark apprenticed with Eddie in the early 90s. Very nice guy. Great sense of humor, but he really was from the old school, let's put it that way. And he taught me what he was taught by an old German hat maker. And that's some of my skill set is what I carried over even today. Mark bought the business when Eddie retired and later relocated to downtown Los Angeles. This is the beginning of a cowboy hat. Where there was much more room for the company's vintage equipment that allows Baron Hats to create virtually any hat imaginable. This particular hat was one by Johnny Depp in Public Enemies. A hat woven right in Mark's shop. So you're creating the actual hat body? From the braid, yes. But we sew it around and around and around and we make a hat body from the straw from and then we stiffen it and then we shape it and block it accordingly, whatever we're trying to build. A character's hat can be as memorable as the actor wearing it, like Russell Crowe's unique outlaw hat in 310 to Yuma, made with a very rare piece of ribbon. Where did you find that? I talked to the costumer from 310 to Yuma because I made the hats for them. This was made sometime in the 1930s. There's only about 15 yards of it and that's all there will be. There's no more. Maybe going to do a limited edition. One last push for 310 to Yuma and recreate the hat band with the original ribbon. And if the material a costumer wants doesn't exist, Baron can make it. Like the braiding a movie costumer wanted for the brim of a Brinkman's hat Mark braided with one of his vintage machines. This is a grosgrain machine. We're making grosgrain here. And you make this because you can't find it anywhere. Not the quality that we want and always the color that we need or the width that we need. So we can do multi-colored. Hat bands, costumes, whatever you need. Baron even makes hats for cartoon characters. So I built three of them and we made the hat for Jesse in Toy Story and then they digitized it. Top secret project. When you go to Mattel, your cell phone gets in a basket. You get it on the way out. It's very, very, very high security. Rock stars are just as particular like Slash and his trademark top hat. It's a pleasure to work with. He's patient and he's also demanding. He wants what he wants and I try to make sure I get what he wants the best I can to provide something that's comfortable on stage and the right style and the right leather and that sort of thing. Bob Dylan's been a customer for years and Baron is the official hat maker for the new Bob Dylan Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Along with the work for the movies, Baron Hats is open to the public as well. So if you'd like a hat like the one Bob Dylan wore or Woody, Oppenheimer or any hat for that matter, they'll be happy to make you one. Here's some custom embroidery we're doing on the crown of a hat. We're doing this chain stitch. Mark and his crew can recreate virtually any kind of hat you can imagine. I could do it. The lobby of Baron Hats is like a museum. His website is full of ideas. A big portion of what we do is commercials, motion picture and television and things, but we certainly are open to the public. We have a little showroom. You can come in and look. You could come up with an idea or ask me to see if I could help create something and bam, make something special for you.