Hatmaking

Replica of a fur felt tricorne
Lindenberg, Mayser GmbH, 1996

Due to the towering hairstyles fashionable in the second half of the 18th century, the chapeau-bras was very common. This small tricorne with a flat crown was carried under the arm as an accessory to an elegant outfit.

After hosiery, hatmaking constituted the most important industry in Erlangen's economy. It had been introduced by the Huguenots in 1686 and soon attained superregional significance. In the main, it produced fine hats made from beaver and hare fur, which were then exported to the provinces on the left bank of the Rhine River, as well as to Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Italy. The industry experienced its heyday between 1770 and 1785. In 1775, Erlangen had 24 hat manufacturing workshops, of which seven were still French-owned at the time.

As did cotton printing, hatmaking also took place in a manufacturing context, i.e. in larger workshops with some degree of division of labour. Hatmaking also differed from the traditional crafts by not being connected to a guild, even though binding rules for the apprentice and journeymen system existed from 1726 onwards.

The French Revolutionary Wars starting in 1792 and the demand crisis they precipitated soon led to the demise of the industry at the beginning of the 19th century.