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posted by leahc on 2010.03.25, under New Category
25:
More about Chicago’s famed “Mad Hatter” Ben Green-field or “Bes-Ben” (1898-1988) :
Heralded as “Chicago’s Mad Hatter” by famously crafting whimsical and elegant hats for women—including such celebrities as Lucille Ball, Marlene Dietrich and Elizabeth Taylor—In 1919, he and his sister, Bessie, opened a store on State Street, combining their first names to create the famous Bes-Ben logo. Within eight years the duo had expanded their business to include five shops. Their hats had become a necessary adornment for Chicago’s society ladies and beyond.
Bes-Ben’s hats were comparatively tame until 1941. Around this time, Mr. Green-Field’s creativity and sense of humor really began to surface in his designs. He began to incorporate unusual items into his hats: firecrackers, skyscrapers, animals, bugs, fruit, doll furniture, palm trees, cigarette packages and even Folies-Bergère dancers. The business thrived until the decline of hat wearing in the late 1960′s.
Still to this day Bes-Ben hats are hugely popular and collectible. They are prized by collectors for their rarity and whimsy. When a hat tops a world auction record it’s bound to turn heads for a good hard look. That’s what Bes-Ben hats are renowned for achieving. One recent auction sale was a Bes-Ben creation called Independence Day. This festive hat was adorned with an unfurled American flag, red, white and blue firecrackers and stars. A furious bidding war erupted between an Illinois collector and a New York collector, and ended in a spontaneous burst of applause as a new world auction record of $18,400 was set, with the hat becoming the prized possession of the Illinois collector.
