Canadians are known for making headlines at the Winter Olympics with their accessories, but this is the first games in recent memory that it hasn't been for our headgear.
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Olympic fashion coveted for moments, despised forever
- February 23, 2010 4:26 PM |
- By Erin Valois
Story provided by
By Gillian Grace, National Post
Canadians are known for making headlines at the Winter Olympics with their accessories, but this is the first games in recent memory that it hasn't been for our headgear.
This year, befitting our newly brash national character, we're neglecting our mothers' admonition that we lose most of our heat through our head, and heading out hatless and be-mittened.
But there was a time when we always, always wore our hats (at least at the Olympics). Here, a look back at the evolution of Canadian Winter Olympic headgear.
1998
Bemoaning the fact, unlike Oprah, Stephen Colbert and some three million others, you're not in possession of one of the those red Bay mittens? Well, console yourself with this -- when was the last time you wore the Roots poor-boy cap, the must-have item of the Nagano games?
2002
OK, we didn't wear these hats. But Canada's Roots unleashed them on the world and sold more than a million to unsuspecting American citizens, who clearly hadn't been warned of our cunning ability to make ugly hats desirable. As soon as the games wrapped, sartorial regret set in. The Utah Daily Chronicle even wrote a piece titled "Everyone Who Bought a Roots Beret is Dumb."
2006
Riffing on two perenially-popular style memes, arctic explorer and aviator, the Bay made a fashion-splash in Turin with a shearling trapper hat, which sold at the company's Olympics-only Italian store.
Honour roll:
1948: Barbara Ann Scott doll, Tam-o'-shanter
Barbara Ann Scott sealed her status as Canadian sports icon by winning the gold medal in figure skating in St. Moritz. Her toy version (which looked suspiciously like Shirley Temple in figure skates) became a must-have for every Canadian girl who still played with dolls (secretly or otherwise). Several different versions were produced, most wore the doll's signature tam hat.
(Scott's flair for headgear wasn't just in doll form -- check out the lace-trimmed number in her portrait by Yousuf Karsh.)
About the Author
- Bruce Arthur Bruce Arthur is the National Post's national sports columnist. A Vancouver native, he has been with the Post since 2001, and a columnist since 2005. He is covering his second Olympics, after the 2008 Games in Beijing. He expects these Games to be slightly less propagandistic, and for China to win slightly fewer medals.
- Joe O'Connor Joe O'Connor is a roving sports feature writer with an open-ended beat. He joined the National Post in 2002, and has spent the past seven years bouncing from sport to sport, offering fresh perspectives and delivering unique stories wherever he goes. Whether it has been getting Don Cherry to open up about his love life; George Chuvalo to talk about heartbreaking loss; or racing down the side of a mountain with former Crazy Canuck, Dave Irwin, the veteran Postie chases a story wherever it leads. Before joining the newspaper he was a two-time silver medalist at the National Magazine Awards. Vancouver will be his first Olympics.
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