33 Keys to Decoding the Korean Wave, Hallyu! 

Oh My Gat!

#12 Kingdom of Hats

 

 

*한류를 이해하는 33가지 코드 #12 모자의 왕국 Kingdom of Hats <Korean version>

https://www.nyculturebeat.com/?mid=Focus&document_srl=4077654

 

"Kingdom" (2019), Netflix 

 

"Oh My Gat!"

“Netflix’s ‘Kingdom’ is so damn good. And the best part of the show, of course, is the hats.”

"Kingdom on Netflix:zombies AND HATS. Life really can't get much better than this."

"Working my way through that Korean #zombie show #Kingdom on #Netflix. Everyone's got kick-ass hats."

"You should watch Kingdom on Netflix. It's about zombies and really fancy hats."

-Twitter-

 

On January 25, 2019, after the thriller "Kingdom" (written by Kim Eun-hee, directed by Kim Seong-hoon) set in the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1987) was released in 190 countries around the world by Netflix for the first time as a Korean drama, the “Kingdom craze” exploded. "Kingdom" is a historical zombie thriller about a Crown Prince, who is accused of being a traitor when the dead king comes back to life, and uncovers the secrets of those who became monsters after starving. For netizens (avid internet users) around the world, one of the main topics of "Kingdom" was none other than the historical Korean hats worn by the characters. 

 

 

'Kingdom' was translated and dubbed into 27 languages on January 25, 2019 and released to 140 million Netflix customers worldwide.

 

Various hats appear in "Kingdom'': Gat (men's hat made from horsehair with a bamboo frame and semi transparent); Heungnip (a horsehair hat worn by scholars when going out); Samo (a thimble-like hat worn by government officials outside the house); Jeollip (worn by military officers and soldiers made of animal hair); Jurip (Gat painted with red lacquer worn by military officers); Jungjagwan (for scholars at home or for teachers); Geumgwan ("gold hat" worn by civil servants for celebratory ceremonies); Goolgun (for the chief mourner at the funeral); and Parangi (for commoners made of bamboo or reed), etc. 

 

Korean hats sold at Amazon.com.

 

As “Kingdom” hats have gained in popularity, global online shopping malls such as Amazon and ebay are selling traditional Korean hats such as Gat,  Ikseongwan, and Jeongjagwan. Several reviewers noted that the lampshade was worn on Halloween and at parties.

 

 

#Praise of Joseon Hats by Westerners in the Age of Enlightenment 

 

In 1883, Percival Lawrence Lowell and the US-Korea trade delegation toured the United States.

 

More than 130 years before netizens were fascinated by Netflix's Korean drama “Kingdom,” Westerners had already paid tribute to Joseon hats. Foreigners who visited Joseon during the enlightenment period were enchanted by the hats of our nation in a three-dimensional reality, not in dramas.

 

Astronomer Percival Lawrence Lowell (1855-1916), who toured the U.S. as an accompanying secretary with the Emperor Gojong's US-Korea trade delegation, stayed in Korea as a foreign secretary and counselor for a special Korean diplomatic mission to the US. And he wrote "Chosön: The Land of the Morning Calm; a Sketch of Korea. Ticknor. 1886". The "On Hats" chapter in this book explains various hats Joseon people wore with photos and illustrations over 17 pages (332p-347p). Lowell wrote, "Especially in Korea, 'the land of hats,' hats are honorable. Actually, first you realize the infinite possibilities of that type of hat, and it is an unexpected discovery." 

 

Lowell explained in this book, "In the house, I wore a hat even though I took off my shoes. Even when I ate, I took off my coat but wore a hat and ate." And, "The gat is a great invention worthy of being ranked the same as the Silk Hat/Top Hat, which is popular in the West. Very finely split bamboo and very thin silk thread are used as materials, and bamboo forms the framework of the silk thread. However, it is so delicately woven that it is impossible to tell which is bamboo and which is silk.” 

 

 Percival Lawrence Lowell, Chosön: The Land of the Morning Calm; a Sketch of Korea. Ticknor. 1886

 

George W. Gilmore (1857-1933), a student at Union Theological Seminary in New York who came as a teacher to Yukyeong Gongwon (Royal English School) in 1886, wrote "Korea from Its Capital (1892)". In the book he recorded Joseon as "a country walking on the cutting edge of hats." 

 

Charles L. Varat (1842-1893), a French explorer and anthropologist who came to Joseon in 1888, wrote in "Voyage en Corée, Le Tour du monde, 1892" referred to Joseon as the 'Kingdom of Hats', writing: "I have never seen a country in which hats were made and used in so many different ways and in all shapes and sizes, from golden cardboard caskets for ministers to humble headscarves for peasants."

 

Lillias H. Underwood, who came to Joseon in 1888 as a medical missionary and married Horace Grant Underwood, a missionary who would become the founder of Yonsei University, became Empress Myeongseong's doctor. Lillias Underwood published "Fifteen Years among the Top-Knots: Life in Korea (1904)". Joseon was a country of topknots and hats worn to cover the topknots. 

 

Westerners who visited Joseon during the enlightenment period paid attention to the hats of the Korean people.

 

Joseph de La Nézière (1873–1944), a French artist who painted the official portrait of King Gojong in 1902, wrote in "l'Extrême Orient en Image (1903)" that Korea has the most unique hat culture., and that Korean hats were had symbolic meaning, and were not just an accessory to the exterior. French journalist and politician Henri Galli (1854-1922) also wrote in his book "La Guerre en Extreme-Orient (1905)", that it was impossible to enumerate all of the different types of Korean hats, and that there were so many different species that I had been told that there might be about 4,000 species. 

 

 

 

An illustration from "Le Petit Journal" featuring the Korean Pavilion at the 1900 Paris Expo.

 

In 1897, King Gojong changed the country's name from Joseon to Korean Empire, and then participated in the Exposition of 1900 (Exposition Universelle of 1900) in Paris, dispatching Min Yeong-chan as a special envoy to the exhibition. In the Pavillon de la Corée, modeled after Gyeongbokgung Palace’s Geunjeongjeon, agricultural products, inlaid helmets, iron weapons, ceramics, sculptures, haegeum, geomungo, chest of drawers, and accessories were displayed. At the time, the French newspaper "Le Petit Journal" published the Korean pavilion with illustrations in a special edition of the exposition, saying "All Koreans are wearing hats." After that, the Korean Empire could not participate further in the Exposition due to the Japanese occupation.

 

 

#Joseon people and hats captured by Western painters during the Japanese colonial period

 

Joseon people painted by Elizabeth Keith.

 

Scottish painter Elizabeth Keith (1887-1956), who visited Korea during the Japanese colonial period in March 1919, co-authored with her sister Elspet Keith Robertson Scott "Old Korea: The Land of Morning Calm (1946)", which noted that Koreans were generally simple, but hats were exceptionally diverse. Depending on the position and class, not only the shape of the hat is different, but the material was also very diverse. So they could quickly identify what kind of person they were just by looking at the hat. 

 

 

 

The Hat Shop by Elizabeth Keith

 

In the book she described that the scholars wear special shaped hats made of horsehair. The betrothed boy wore a yellow straw round hat (Chorip). At the wedding ceremony, the groom wore a hat (Samo) and held a wedding goose. These customs were changing today, and Korean men, like other men, wore ugly modern felt hats. 

 

Paul Jacoulet's Korean portraits

 

Meanwhile, French painter Paul Jacoulet (1896-1960) began living in Japan at the age of three, where his father taught at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. He studied Japanese genre painting, ukiyo-e (浮世繪) and woodblock prints. In 1929, he often visited Korea to meet his mother, who had remarried to a Japanese professor at Gyeongseong Imperial University, during which visits he painted Koreans. While working in Japan, he had a Korean (Na Yeong-hwan) as his assistant and adopted his daughter. In 2019, "Paul Jacoulet: Multicolored Joseon" was held at the Seoul Museum.

 

 

#The Short Hair Act of 1895 that shocked Koreans 

 

"A person's body, fur, and flesh are inherited from his parents, so it is the beginning of filial piety not to dare to damage them."

-"Classic of Filial Piety” (孝經)- 

 

Shin Yun-bok (1758-1814), Yugwak Jaengung’ (遊廓爭雄), from ‘Hyewon Album’. National Treasure No. 135. Collection of Kansong Art Museum, Seoul 

 

Koreans kept the first verse of this '"Hyogyeong (Classic of Filial Piety)”, the teaching of Confucianism, since the era of the Three Kingdoms (BC 100-AD 700). The boys wore a daenggi (fabric ribbon), and when they reached adulthood, they put on a topknot with their hair up and put on a hat.

 

On December 30, 1895 (32nd year of Gojong), the cabinet of Kim Hong-jip issued a decree, "Danbalyeong (Short Hair Act)," that shocked Koreans. King Gojong, the Crown Prince (Sunjong), and his servants showed a demonstration of cutting the topknot, and Yu Gil-joon, the Minister of Home Affairs, supervised the people's hair being forcibly cut with a knife and scissors. Neo-Confucian scholars and the public strongly protested against the decree. The Eulmi Incident (the mass murder of Empress Myeongseong and others) and "Short Hair Act" decree inflamed anti-Japanese sentiment and served as an opportunity for the Righteous Armies to rise across the country.

 

In 1896, Gojong and the Crown Prince escaped from Gyeongbokgung Palace, which was occupied by the Japanese military and pro-Japanese cabinet, and fled to the Russian legation (Agwanpacheon).  A pro-Russian cabinet appeared, and the "Short Hair Act" was withdrawn. Jeong Byeong-ha, who cut Gojong's hair, was massacred, and Yu Gil-joon, the Minister of Home Affairs, who cut Sunjong's hair, defected to Japan.

 

After the Korean Empire was declared in 1897, the Short Hair Act was revived as part of modernization (Gwangmu Reform) in 1900, and the sense of rejection decreased. Many people still refused to cut their hair short until the 1930s.

 

 

#A Korean chicken King Buys Napoleon's Hat

 

 

Joseph Charbord (1786-1848), Napoleon on the field of Wagram, 1810 

 

"A two-cornered hat that belonged to French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte was sold to a South Korean bidder for 1.9 million euros ($2.4 million) at auction near Paris on Sunday. Jean-Pierre Osenat of the Osenat auction house in Fontainebleau said the buyer acquired the black "bicorne" felt hat in a sale of Napoleon-era items from the collections of the Prince of Monaco."

-NBC News, November 17, 2014-

 

The buyer was a Korean businessman Kim Hong-kuk, nicknamed "Chicken King" by the Korea JoongAng Daily. Kim, the chairman of Harim Group, Korea's largest poultry producer, said in a statement: "I have always admired Napoleon Bonaparte’s challenging spirit of ‘Nothing is impossible.’  With the intent of once more awakening my entrepreneurial spirit, I purchased Napoleon I’s hat at auction.”

 

The two-pointed hat, a style widely worn by military officers at the time, was apparently donned by Napoleon during the Battle of Marengo in 1800. Made of black felt beaver hair, the original estimated price was 300,000 to 400,000 euros, but it was auctioned off at a price five times that. Napoleon wore 120 bicorne hats in his lifetime, of which 19 remain. The auctioned hat was sold by the Monaco Grimaldi royal family to raise funds for the restoration of their palace. 

 

 

#Hat designer Eugenia Kim

 

 

Eugenia Kim became famous as a designer of hats worn by stars such as Madonna, Cameron Diaz, Gwyneth Paltrow, Sarah Jessica Parker, Lindsay Lohan, Jennifer Lopez, Britney Spears, Paris Hilton and Lauryn Hill. Raised in Pennsylvania, she studied psychology at Dartmouth College. Kim aspired to go to medical school, but changed her dream when she was hospitalized for a month from an accident. 

 

After she graduated college, she moved to New York City where she studied hat making at the Parsons School of Design, while she worked part-time for the fashion magazine Allure. Vera Wang was a Vogue magazine editor, and Kate Spade worked as a Mademoiselle magazine editor before they became successful designers. 

 

 

 

One day Eugenia Kim didn't like her haircut, so she shaved it off and started wearing a hat decorated with feathers. After receiving compliments from people, she started making hats, and began selling them at Barneys New York department store. In 1997 she opened her little boutique, Eugenia Kim, in the East Village in New York City. She launched her shoe line in 2004, and in the same year she won the Council of Fashion Designers (CFDA) Accessory Design Award. 

 

 

In 2006, she published "Saturday Night Hat: Quick, Easy Hat Making for the Downtown Girl." She also designed limited edition hats for Urban Outfitters in 2009 and Target in 2010. Princess Marlene of Sweden wore a Eugenia Kim hat at her wedding to Prince Albert of Monaco in 2011.  Eugenia Kim's hats are sold in over 100 boutiques around the world, including famous department stores such as Bloomingdale's, Saks 5th Avenue, and Neiman Marcus. http://www.eugeniakim.com

 

 

#Carolina Herrera "Gat and Hanbok are my inspiration" 

 

Carolina Herrera, Spring 2011 Ready-to-Wear, New York Fashion Week, September, 2010 VOGUE

 

In September 2010, fashion designer Carolina Herrera attracted attention at the New York Fashion Week by unveiling her Spring 2011 Ready-to-Wear collection, which was inspired by the Korean hat, Gat, and Korean traditional dress 'Hanbok' lines. Characterized by asymmetrical lines and understated grandeur, Carolina Herrera explained in the program notes that the Spring collection was inspired by two things: the traditional clothes of Korea, and botanical plates collected in the eighteenth century. It was a collection that harmonizes evening dresses, one-piece dresses, and Joseon scholar's hats matched with shirt pants, evening dresses that apply the collar and pus lines of hanbok, and floral prints.

 

 

#Joseon Yongbongmundujeong Helmet at the Brooklyn Museum

 

Helmet, 19th century. Leather, lacquer, gilt-copper, wool, silk brocade, hemp-cloth(left)/ Hat Case, late 19th century. Papier mache, lacquer, bamboo, silk, lacquer & Official's Top Hat (Gat), 19th century. Lacquered horsehair mesh, silk, Brim. Brooklyn Museum Collection

 

The highlight of the hats of the Joseon Dynasty would be the hats of simple scholars and fancy hats of kings.

 

The Brooklyn Museum houses two pieces of Yongbong (dragon and phoenix) patterned head armor and two pieces of Yongbong-patterned headpiece, which are believed to have been worn by kings during ceremonies in the Joseon Dynasty. The helmet is brass plated with gold, and the surface is lacquered black. It is decorated with dragon, phoenix, and flower shapes, and has side and back rims.

 

Dr. Kwon Joon-hee, a scholar on ancient clothing, said in an interview with me for The Korea Daily New York in 2010: "The dragon pattern is important, but the number of claws on a dragon distinguishes its status. Considering that it has five toenails, it seems to belong to the king. After king Gojong became emperor, he wore yellow (red). It could be Cheoljong before or before the emperor's accession," she explained.

 

 

Joan Cummins, curator of Asian art at the Brooklyn Museum, said, “Around 1913, Stewart Culin, the museum’s first Asian curator, visited Korea and Japan to collect art and purchased them. However, there is no record of exactly when they entered the museum.”  The reason why X is added in front of the artifact number is because the year is not clear. The Brooklyn Museum has a collection of about 600 pieces of Korean art, including moon jars, Nam June Paik artworks, Joseon Dynasty Gat, and Gatjip (hat containers). https://www.brooklynmuseum.org

 

 

#New York Exhibition "Korea: A Land of Hats"

 

"Joseon, Land of Hats" Korean Exhibition (2010)/ New York Charles Wang Center Exhibition (2019) Poster

 

The craze for the Joseon hat in "Kingdom'' that started in January 2019 continued to New York in the fall of 2019.  A special exhibition, “Korea: A Land of Hats (9/10/19-12/5/19)” was held at the SUNY Stony Brook Charles B. Wang Center (director Jinyoung Jin) in Long Island, New York. This exhibition, co-organized with the Korean Cultural Center New York (Director Cho Yoon-jeung) and Korea's Coreana Cosmetics Museum (Director Yoo Sang-ok, Yoo Seung-hee), showed that hats in the Joseon Dynasty went beyond their role as simple accessories, and symbolized social status, occupation, age, and marital status. It was a special exhibition that shed light on the roles, functions, and meanings of hats, gender, and season. Earlier, in 2010, an exhibition “Joseon: in the Land of Hats” was held at the Coreana Cosmetic Museum in Seoul. 

 

The authentic traditional Korean hats were recreated by surviving artisans, who have been designated as living persons of Important Intangible Cultural Heritage. In the exhibition, men's hats reproduced by Park Chang-yeong, the 4th Holder of Important Intangible Cultural Properties, and gold crowns by Park Seong-ho, the 50th Holder of Seoul Intangible Cultural Heritage and 30 types of traditional hats by the 107th Holder of National Intangible Cultural  Yu Seon-hee, were presented. Along with this, prints by Elizabeth Keith and Paul Jacoulet, old books and vintage postcards with images of hats were also exhibited. During the exhibition, Gat Master Park Chang-young held a workshop on making Korean traditional hats using modern materials for FIT(Fashion Institute of Technology) students. 

 

*33 Keys to Decoding the Korean Wave, Hallyu: contents <English> 

http://www.nyculturebeat.com/index.php?mid=Zoom&document_srl=4068226