Talk:Stovepipe hat

Sorry, but Troughton’s hat never was a “stovepipe”, and if it was called that in prose stories, it was simply misidentified.

It’s nothing to do with “some” fashion experts disagreeing, asthe article suggests, it’s that it’s wrong, plain and simple. It’s like saying that because his trousers were checked, Troughton was wearing a kilt, but just one with legs, and not tartan. It’s sort of right, but mostly entirely wrong.

To be a “stovepipe” the hat has to be both flat on top, and cylindrical, keeping the same diameter all the way up. A top hat has a smaller diameter at the bottom than at the top, flaring outwards from hatband to crown.

Troughton’s Doctor wears a “Paris Beau”, a hat which has a diminishing diameter from bottom to top, verging on the conical, with a rounded top, and a distinctive brim which curls up at the sides and down at the front and back. It’s from at least a generation before the stovepipe came to prominence, and was popular during the Regency period in England, and favoured by the “Aristos” of pre-Revolutionary France.