Straw Hat Day is celebrated annually on May 15. The holiday was invented in the USA in 2010, and then it quickly spread around the world and became popular among people of all ages. A straw hat is an accessory that has served people for thousands of years.

The first straw hats in the European part appeared in Ancient Greece – shepherds wove them from the simplest and most accessible material, which literally lay underfoot. Then, for several centuries, they remained in demand as headwear for peasants and craftsmen. In the Middle Ages, the shape and colour, as well as the way hats were decorated, indicated a person's social category or professional affiliation. For example, noblemen wore hats decorated with gems and jewels, townspeople often favoured black models, and doctors wore tall hats. By the shape, colour and decoration of the hat it was quite easy to distinguish a merchant from a blacksmith and a peasant from an artisan. Straw hats were also worn in the East: cone-shaped hats made of whitened rice stalks are still a distinctive feature of Southeast Asians. The Vietnamese goddess, with a huge hat made of four leaves held together by bamboo stalks, descended from the heavens to protect people from heavy rain.

Like many other wardrobe items that have become fashionable and popular among women, the straw hat was originally considered a men's accessory, and it was only in the 17^th century that this monopoly came to an end. It is believed that the fashion for straw accessories was introduced by French Queen Marie Antoinette. The outfit combined with the hat created the image of a lovely gardener, which was praised by painters and poets of the time.

It was not only wheat stalks that were used to make hats, other plants were also used. For example, these are the fibres from agave leaves, the smooth surface of which glosses the product, and it looks very elegant and spectacular. Seaweed, stalks of Florentine wheat, rice straw, leaves of banana palm, which grows in the Philippine Islands, toquilla (Ecuadorian plant) and other herbaceous materials are also used. The original material – straw – remains unchanged in any case. Directly during the process of creating this headdress, the hat is subjected to various influences. In order to make it pleasant and comfortable to wear, the product is softened by treating it with hot steam, soaking in warm water and then manually adjusting the shape to the required dimensional characters. Mostly women were traditionally engaged in the production of handmade straw hats on an industrial scale, thus making a significant contribution to the family budget.

The 20^th century accumulated all the ‘hat’ ideas of the past – each decade favouring one or another model and making it a symbol of the era. Thus, in the 20s, Coco Chanel popularised bell-shaped hats – ‘cloche’, in the 30s, with the easy hand of Greta Garbo, the ‘slouch’ models came into fashion – hats with flattened brim, mysteriously covering the face. Hats were worn by everyone: workers, aristocrats, American farmers, Venetian gondoliers, hippies and pop culture stars.

They are still popular today! What a variety of hats can be observed today! Boater, panama, sombrero, wide-brimmed floppy and many other models of hats. No wonder that everyone can find a hat to suit their tastes!

There are straw hat museums all over the world, one of the most famous is the Domenico Michel a cci Straw Hat and Weaving Art Museum in Signa (a suburb of Florence).

A photo album dedicated to the International Straw Hat Day is posted in the Museum Photo Gallery.

The collection of mechanical dolls and automata of the museum Collection is unrivaled in Russia and is recognised by experts as one of the best in the world.
The section ‘Amusing Automata’ features all kinds and forms of mechanical toys of the 18^th– 20^th centuries.