Making sugegasa at home, Shikano sugegasa

The sugegasa is a type of straw hat used by those working in farming and other outdoor occupations. Its woven structure allows a flow of air to the head on hot days, but the stems of the sedge expand in rainy weather to seal any gaps, making it waterproof. Each region has its own variation of the sugegasa. Straw hats from the Shikano region are made from a type of sedge called kasasuge. The cylindrical hat, topped with a “dragonfly knot”, has a beautiful crimson-red tinge. In order to achieve this red tone, the sedge has to be cropped at the base with a sickle, rather than harvesting by machine. According to 18th century records, Shikano’s sedge hats used to be distributed via the Inaba area (east of Tottori prefecture). At their peak around 1935, over 80,000 hats were produced every year. There were about 70 households making these hats for supplementary income. In 1955 a sales guild was established, and hats were also exported to the U.S. Today Shikano continues to export sedge hats, still measured in inches. As cheap plastic raincoats began to spread, and widening job opportunities for married women led to fewer craftswomen working by hand, Shikano’s sedge hat production started to decline.