The Conservator

By Eric Twardzik

Nicholas Engel is a modern-day hatter operating out of a workshop in San Diego, where he makes custom fedoras, homburgs, Regency-style top hats and much more under the name NICHOLAS T. ENGEL HATTERS. But he is so much more than that. He is a conservator. 

For much of the previous century, the decision to wear a hat didn’t imply much about the man wearing it; it was simply the uniform of everyday life. But for well over fifty years, donning a proper hat in public has marked the wearer as something different: a nostalgist, a romantic, or more simply, a “hat guy.” Conserving the craft of hat-making and preserving the lifestyle of hat-wearing is his life’s work.

“I’m not expecting the world to be the way I want it to be, or demand that it be. I’m just trying to conserve and do what I love in a way that I think the world is most beautiful to me.” Learn more about Nicholas and his passion for this craft in the FALL 2021 issue of SARTO, available in our newsstand.