Holiday Tea at the Adolphus, December 27, 2008

Holiday Tea at the Adolphus was wonderful. This was our second time to meet here, the last time was in 2003. As you can see from the number in attendance, this is a very popular event. Tea is held in the lobby of this beautiful old, historic hotel. We sat on sofas and tea was served on the coffee tables. Our tea captain informed us it was perfectly proper to put our plate on our lap to eat since the table was so low. We had three courses, starting with tea sandwiches, then a raisin scone with Yorkshire cream and fresh strawberry marmalade and then an assortment of desserts. We drank several wonderfully exotic teas. Everyone was dressed very elegantly.Back Row: Rhonda, Kelley, Joyce, Maureen, Benita, Shannon, Raquel, Betsy and Loretta

Front Row: Nicole, Suzanne, Margarita and Carly

Benita, Nicole and Maureen, all looking fabulous.

You can only see Nicole partially here, but she has the attention of Betsy, Kelley and Margarita.

We were seated in three groupings for tea. Betsy, Rhonda, Joyce and Loretta enjoy visiting here.

Carly and Nicole having a good time; all smiles.





















Margarita and Kelley; both wore large brim brown hats with brown satin ribbon trim.




Maureen and Nicole in front of the huge Christmas tree in the lobby of the Adolphus.




















Maureen and Benita chatting. They dressed in the similar colors!


The lobby is beautiful.





















Nicole in her cute pink hat and Margarita looking very sophisticated.

Rhonda posed with our tea captain.

Suzanne and Carly

A second group photo.

Fashion on Main - November 22, 2008

Promenade of Style: The Caralee Biery Smith Collection

The Dallas Hat Band was fortunate to visit Fashion on Main and to see this beautiful exhibit of clothing from the 1830s - 1890s. The detail and beauty of the dresses is exquisite and the condition of this vintage clothing is remarkable. Caralee invited us to join our meeting with the Costume Society of America's meeting and she was available to share her knowledge with us. Fashion on Main is presented by the Texas Fashion Collection, College of Visual Arts and Design at the University of North Texas.

Myra of UNT gave us a "behind the scenes" tour of the unfinished area that will become the expanded exhibit area of Fashion on Main. The University has purchased this historical building, which opened in 1929 as the department store Titche Goettinger, or just Titche's, then became Joske's and later closed altogether in 1986. Today it also houses apartments.

The current exhibit area is only 500 square feet, which limits what can be exhibited. The new space will be much larger and allow special exhibits that it has been unable to accommodate in the past.

Suzanne and daughter Carly.

The dress behind them is Civil War era,

having a bit of a military look.

Joyce in that cute red hat and Benita with her unique vintage flair including fox tails and veil.

Nicole enjoying the view among the beautiful lace wedding gowns.

Cynthia and Maureen looking very stylish.

From the exhibit, we walked the short distance to Neiman Marcus and had a wonderful lunch at the Zodiac.



Joyce was wearing this darling red Lilly Dache hat. During lunch, she shared her interesting story about the hat. Many, many years ago, she came to Dallas to shop at A. Harris, a prominent department store. In those days, women wore a hat and gloves to go shopping downtown. For those of you who haven't been around Dallas that long, A. Harris Department Store merged with Sanger Brothers in 1961 and became Sanger Harris, which later became Foleys in 1987. Anyway, back to the story. She found this wonderful hat at A. Harris and wanted it so much. But she had 4 small children and she couldn't even consider such a hat. She kept going back and admiring it. As it happened, friends invited her to their country club to play BINGO, and, you guessed it, she won the jackpot and rushed over to spend her winnings on the hat.

Carly in the forefront, Benita and Betsy next to her.

Loretta, Laurel (oops, caught her by surprise) and Nicole.

Self portrait taken by Carly with her mother, Suzanne.

Kelley brought a gentleman friend, Dorian, her grandson.

He is a cutie and a perfect gentleman. He even wore a hat,

but like all gentlemen, he took it off at the table.

Stephanie, Margarita and Cynthia enjoying good conversation and wonderful food.

This was a really fun meeting of the Dallas Hat Band and we had a really good turnout. Thanks to all for your attendance and support. See you in December for our Holiday Tea at the Adolphus.

Dallas Hat Band, October 25, 2008

Brunch and "The Women"Rhonda was the perfect hostess. It was a beautiful day and we started out by the pool. She chose a Fez for the occasion.
Loretta and Benita relaxed by the pool and sipped champagne.


Nicole, Joyce, Maureen, Rhonda and Margarita. We ate scones and drank Mimosas.

Nicole, Joyce, Maureen, Benita, Margarita, Loretta, Rhonda and Suzanne - what a great looking group of hat aficionados.

I set the timer on the camera and ran and got in the picture. The lounge chair was the spot saved for me. Notice that Nicole is assisting me with my champagne.

Maureen and Margarita enjoying brunch. The table setting was both beautiful and elegant.

Joyce always looks so good!

Rhonda, Loretta and Benita trying out the quiche. Benita's blue vintage hat belonged to her mother.

Getting ready for the movie. We watched the 1939 movie "The Women" with its all female cast. The dialogue was so good and the hats and fashion were marvelous. This was such a fun meeting.

Old Downtown Carrollton July 19, 2008

The Hat Band at Vintage Martini Vintage Martini....don't you love the name? You can't see it very well in this photo, but the dress on the mannequin in the window is covered entirely with flowers.

Joyce, Rhonda, Laurel, Nicole, Suzanne, Maureen, Cynthia

Greg and Ken have a wonderful vintage store and they are so welcoming. They have lots of treasures and the clothes are organized very well and they have great vintage hats! Great finds! Ken pulled down a darling green doll hat and wanted a volunteer to try it on. Cynthia was standing near and she did not have her hat on, so he put the doll hat on her. She said she didn't look good in small hats and then she looked in the mirror. It looked darling! It didn't come off of her head until she bought it. I didn't get a picture, but she promised to wear it to a future meeting.

We had a nice lunch at Agave Azul. Here are a few candid photos.

Nicole and Joyce.

We learned that Joyce is a self described biker babe!

Laurel told us about her vacation in New York.

Cynthia and Maureen. Welcome Cynthia. She has just returned to Texas after living 20 years in Colombia and she loves hats. Our kind of gal!

Rhonda and Nicole.

Maureen looking utterly stylish and cool as a cucumber in her 20s style dress and large red hat.

Hat Band Meeting at Rise, June 14, 2008

June 14 is Flag Day, but for the Hat Band, it was Souffle Day. Yum!Standing: The Chef, Suzanne, Joyce, Benita, Hedda

Sitting: Nicole, Margarita, Rhonda

Benita displaying her vintage hankie while we were waiting to be seated.

Welcome to new member Joyce, pretty in pink. She recently moved from Tyler.

Hedda, one of the owners of Rise, graciously brought in some of her special hats to show us. Here she is modeling one of them.

Margarita in vibrant color and Rhonda looking very chic.

Letter tiles on the table were fun to arrange into hat related words. We entertained ourselves with them while we waited for our souffles.





Suzanne ready to enjoy her souffle.

Nicole, also looking pretty in pink.

As we left, we were invited to draw one of these folding cards from a big jar. They were a sort of non-edible fortune cookie with little quotes. Here is an example of one: "To know is not to prove, nor to explain. It is to accede to vision. Flight to Arras"