Had a marvelous weekend touring around Victoria with my grandparents. I also was treated to a second celebration of my birthday with friends that went brilliantly asside from my bursting into tears in the middle of the dance floor over an Edward Sharpe techno mashup. Who in they’re right mind remixes an indie love song in a top 40′s playing bar-star-bar (Why were we there you ask? That’s all they have for dancing in Victoria I was told). After my friends wrestled my phone away from me and The Outfield Your Love and Journey started playing I was right as rain. Journey always makes me feel better. Yum.

I found something I’ve been looking long and hard for in Victoria! While wandering the streets we came across an Antiques store dedicated to military apparel and memorabilia. I made a beeline left and started scouring the shelves and corners for hats until I found…A pile of vintage Garrison caps!

The The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English (Thanks Wikipedia sources) gives some very interesting synonyms for the garrison cap including  the overseas cap, envelope hat, piss-cutter cap, chip hat, and cunt cap! Language language soldiers! You may recognize a garrison cap from vintage pin ups, military and World War I and II media. They also resemble the steryotypical flight attendant caps ; )

The garrison cap originated during ww1 by the french and  was adopted by the U.S. and Canada later , then modified to differentiate between the rank of officers and soldiers. Piping colour indicated the branch of service. They were made in cloth, wool and Kaki for different weather conditions. They’re still worn today by our Canadian Air Force Association and the Royal Canadian Airforce cadets. De rigure!

Mine doesn’t have any piping, which leads me to believe it was made before WWII and the woman at the store mentioned the pin was St. Andrew. Still researching the significance of that and will post when I figure out its origins.

Going to measure this baby up and made a replica in felt! Can’t wait till I can find the time. 53 days until graduation! 1 Month and 22 days, 7 weeks, 1272 hours till its OVER.