Grade Your Panama Hats to Get the Best

Often people when they go to buy the Panama hats would get into great confusion when it comes to grade the hat. Well, to a layman, all the Panama Straw Hats seems equal. But when the price seems different from each hats the confusion adds more. Sometimes the locals cheat them when they sell the Panama Hats saying it to be ultra fino or super fino. Do not get entangled with the word ‘fino’. Best is you see if the Panama Straw Hats are indeed ultra fino yourself.

Of course the first thing you have to see when you grade a Panama Hat is the fineness of the weave. Anyone would know how the weavings are done. Even a child can make that out. When you go for Panama Straw Hat shopping, always take a closer look at the hat weaves. The finest Straw Hats will be the one that are weaved very thinly. When the weaves are finely done, the grading also increases and of course, the amount of work must also have doubled. The Montecristi Hats have always surpasses the Cuenca Panama hats. The reason- it takes only three days to weave a Cuenca hat while the Montecristi Hat takes months of careful work.

Do not take the grading system of the locals too seriously. There is actually no standardized system of grading. One local grading might differ from another even when the weaves are same. Most of them would grade their Panama Straw Hats as Fino, Fino-Fino, Super Fino, Ultra fino or Museum quality.

Coming back to grade the Panama Hats, all you need to do is see the fine quality of the weave. Second the color. While you view for the quality of the hat weave just see if the pattern of the weaves are homogenous and straight all through the hat surface. Though it cannot be 100% perfect but still the closest will do. The colors of the Panama Straw Hats can also differ from one to another. See if the colors are even throughout the hat surface. Sometimes you will find uneven colors. It is perfect to have slightly different shades but not the one that are too noticeable.

The traditional way of finding the finest quality Panama Straw Hat is by counting the number of rings and vueltas. You will find these rings on the inside of the crown when you view it holding it up to a light. The ring or vueltas are formed when the weavers add new strands of straws while weaving. The point is when you find large amount of rings, the weaves are tighter and finer.

A final tip that would help you to see the fineness of the weave is by counting weaves in number in a square inch of the Panama hat first horizontally and then vertically. By measuring the number of horizontal rows and multiplying it by the number of vertical rows. Usually the vertical count will be larger than the horizontal. The result will be the Montecristi Cuenta (Count). When the Montecristi Cuenta is more than 900 then, it is the most finest, a treasure so to say. If it is less than 200 then, it is not that worthy if you are looking for an original Montecristi Panama hat. Though this is a tedious job to count the weaves but it is worthy at the end.