It’s no secret that Wilgart is growing. The benefits of many returning loyal customers, as well as the trend in society that favors craftsmanship, quality, and honest, locally produced caps, keeps us growing. It puts the needle and thread in motion, so to speak, in our small cap workshop.

This year promises to be the year in Wilgart’s history where we have sewn the most caps in Denmark, up to 600 pieces, and at the same time we have successfully introduced new product groups, including belts, scarves, hats and gloves. Furthermore, Wilgart has managed to attract attention by participating in markets around the country and external collaborations.

Recently, Tomas, who owns the company, and I have been considering whether it’s time to expand the ownership. If the success continues, we will need more key people to develop and build new initiatives. If you have an entrepreneurial spirit, think hats are the best thing in the world, or are cool at sewing, please drop by at any opportunity. We’re taking it slow, and our expectation is that Wilgart will find the right person within the next 2-3 years.

It’s not every day, every year, not even every decade that a substantial book about caps and hats is published – and certainly not in Danish!

That’s why it’s an event that we intend to celebrate in good company. So if you want to join us at Wilgart’s book reception, sign up for our newsletter or follow us on social media. You won’t want to miss this spiritual 350-page explosion of knowledge about hats, culture and craftsmanship.

Locally produced shirts inspired by the legendary Hawaiian shirts are now being relaunched by Wilgart.

These are summery garments with a special Bornholm Hawaiian-inspired aesthetic. Equipped with familiar Bornholm motifs and Bornholm island culture.

The fabric is lightweight viscose woven from breathable natural fibers – the perfect fabric for a loose summer shirt.

The motifs are a tribute to the sunshine island in the 1950s. Back then, visitors traveled to Bornholm by either the ferries Rotna, Hammershus or Kongedybet. Or they flew with the propeller airplane from Det Danske Luftfartsselskab.

When guests arrived, it was to enjoy the summer, the sights, the nature – life! And perhaps also the temptations of summer. They could be found in the smokehouses in the form of smoked herring, and they could be found in the hotels, which in the evening had musicians playing music for dancing in the grand ballrooms.

For more than 100 years, Bornholm has lured vacationers to the beaches, varied nature, historical monuments and the sense of freedom and lightness that arrives with summer vacation. The summery impressions and good vibes are the inspiration for your new shirt.

The shirt is sewn in viscose, a lightweight fabric that allows the body to breathe. In other words, it’s made for loose summer shirts. If you explore the motifs printed on the shirt, you will find a number of impressions that belong on Bornholm: There’s the fishing boat and the smoked herring. There are the figs that sailors once brought home to the island long, long ago. And there are the eider ducks that breed on Christiansø.

Godâ Skjorter (Bornholm for Aloha Shirts) was founded by Niels Ebdrup in 2018, with a vision to create Hawaiian shirts with local motifs, sewn and sold on Bornholm. Niels’ entrepreneurship took off, and for a number of years the shirts were widely used and loved by the local population on Bornholm. The project subsequently needed new forces, and in 2023 Wilgart signed a transfer contract with Niels Ebdrup and relaunched the Bornholm-produced Hawaiian shirt with a new name and logo. The Bornholmer Shirt will continue to be produced on Bornholm, and we are always looking for new exciting collaborations on motifs and prints for the shirt.

Each BornholmserSkorte comes in one of these colorful boxes.

This project is about love for Bornholm and for a cool product with a good story. There is good synergy between Wilgart’s other activities and this new business branch. If the project enjoys the necessary support, the island’s residents can once again be proud that they once again have their very own special Bornholm shirt, with an associated increased quality of life as a result.

The Bornholm shirt contributes to a large extent to the story of Bornholm, as an island that supports entrepreneurship, craftsmanship and unique products.

Since Wilgart took over the Bornholm shirt, we have so far only produced shirts from the same materials as before. As something new, in 2024 we introduced the shirt as a women’s model, based on cuts we received from Bente Hammer. As a result, the Bornholmer shirt is now also available with incisions and long sleeves.

In the long term, we dream of publishing new prints and limited editions, and in this context, we are constantly looking for artists who would like to be published on the local Bornholm hawaii shirt. We’d love to hear from you if you have an original idea.

Wilgart has started a collaboration with RHANDERS on a very special baseball cap. The cap is developed and crafted in collaboration with RHANDERS, who share our desire to promote premium Danish design and craftsmanship that is made to last. If you want one of these unique caps, they can be purchased on RHANDER’s website and in their stores.

The black wool is woven in Germany, and the lining of the cap is of the finest silk. The brim is covered with the soft and noble glove leather from Rhanders (formerly Randers Glove Factory).

The Baseball cap from Wilgart is handmade in Denmark. The visors for the cap are laser cut on our own laser cutter on Bornholm, just as the fine silk and soft wool are cut at our cap maker workshop on Soldalen, Bornholm.

What is a cap and what is a hat?

Very often hats are confused with caps and vice versa. I often get to call a hat for a hat, a cap for a cap, but also allow a hat for a cap, and say cap to a hat! Thus reinforcing the cluttered relationship between a living language contrary to the professional terms of the industry. However, when explaining why Wilgart is the last capmaker up North in Scandinavia, then the distinction between hatmakers and capmakers comes sharply worded, just like my master Herr Bullmann used to say it.

“Wir sind Mützenmacher”

We are capmakers, he explains me. Everything we make is from woven materials, cut by a tailor’s scissor and sewn together on a sewing machine. Hatmakers, they work mostly with felt, which is then steamed and pressed into shape. Both categories apply to making headgear, but the artisanship is anything alike.

“Ich bin ein Mützenmacher” Herr Bullmann said to his apprentice, with a severe voice pitch and sincere pride. And from that day, Wilgart understood the distinction.

Danish milliners society

Being a capmaker myself, this divide has proven very handy. First, I get to call myself the last capmaker in the North, which is true since I don’t know anybody else here specialized in cap headgear. In addition, I get to meet with a creative and inspiring little community of hatmakers and milliners in Copenhagen: Danish milliners and hatmakers where the exclusiveness of my craftsmanship gives me a special status from the rest of the group. A position with inbound privileges and drawbacks.

Some of the great milliners in Copenhagen are experimenting with capmaking, and therefore have a couple of caps in their portfolio. However, when looking at the process and methods used to making those pieces, I get the feeling inside of not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Not meant in a taunting way, but the workarounds when making those, de facto beautiful and admirable headpieces, just have so much of a DIY (Do-it-yourself) feeling to them. Which in the end proves that humans – and hatters in particular – are very creative and skilled people, able to work out finished goods in areas that detours their original craft.

My perspective

I always try to spread knowledge of the working methods I experienced through my apprenticeship at the small batch manufacturing workshop in Germany where Herr Bullmann taught me cap making. In doing so, most members of the hatmaker-group who discover these insights, explain some of the frustration  experienced in the cumbersome process they went through when making caps. Sharing this knowledge about an old craft like capmaking keeps the craft alive and maintains a specific know-how from getting lost in history. Simultaneously, I believe there could be a lot more capmakers up and running, and if you´re eager to learn an old craft, then let me know prompt! I might consider getting an apprentice myself. When thinking about my masters’ stern speech about capmakers vs. hatmakers I can extract one essential overall message, which is:
Good capmakers are awesome. Let us be more!

A cap maker creates all headgear that comes from cutting, typically in woven textiles, and manufacturing by sewing, ironing, etc.

A hatter makes his goods in felt, and shapes it by steam, stretch and heat. In this way, the cap maker profession leans more towards the tailoring profession, with a strong focus on headgear, while the hatter profession is specifically craftsmanship in a class of its own.

Read our blog post about: Capmaker vs. Hatmaker

The company’s growth strategy

With the workshop on Bornholm, we are now able to produce our own caps locally, but production and sales must go hand in hand. Therefore, our strategy is that with the past year’s main focus on production, next year’s most important activity will be concentrated on sales. In relation to Bornholm, the goal for 2019 is to produce 800 caps and hats. Compared to 2018, where we have produced and sold approx. 200 pieces, this is four times the amount. We believe this is a realistic goal and look forward to getting started.

Sale of caps from Denmark

How can you help support good craftsmanship, Danish production and high quality? With three new initiatives, we will disseminate Danish-produced headgear:

1. New collaborations – We are looking for companies with distribution and sales networks in Denmark who want to cooperate.
2. We are planning a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter. In this regard, we are extremely excited for everyone who wants to share the campaign. This is an important prerequisite for online success.
3. We will open a new sales point on Bornholm near the production, where individual orders can also be processed. The plan is for it to be open during the summer season, but terms and opening hours have not yet been decided.

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