BY THE SEASIDE - Our SS23/24 Collection

The House Of Hats Newest Collection….’ BY THE SEASIDE ‘ is here just in time for summer.. Step into a world of timeless charm and elegance.

Get ready to elevate your summer style with The House of Hats latest collection of stunning handcrafted hats!

Made from only the finest material and inspired by the timeless fashion of the 1930s our new collection is the perfect addition to your summer wardrobe.

Offering nine new original handcrafted styles exclusive to our brand each delicate piece has been expertly handcrafted in our Sydney Studio by renowned Milliner Ilana Meilak, ensuring that every hat is of the highest quality and designed to last.

We’ve added our signature style of adding vintage trims and buckles to this collection to keep it authentic to the era.

Whether you’ve looking for a stylist for a day at the beach, a chic addition to your summer outfit or simply want to make a statement at your next event, our new collection has something for everyone.

So why wait? head over to our shop to view tghe full collection or pop into our Sydney Showroom to try them all on in person.

Trust us, you wont be disappointed…..

ilana is wearing our AHOY MINI BOATER in French Navy

Watch our ‘ BY THE SEASIDE Campaign Video to view the Collection

NEW ARRIVALS - Our Rhinestone Hair Barrett & Brooch

TWO HEARTS - Black Felt Two Hearts Rhinestone Hair Barrette

New to our shop is this super glamorous Black Felt hand cut double heart hair clip , featuring a rhinestone trim

Vintage inspired and oh so old Hollywood …perfect with a vintage hair style or just to bling up an outfit .

Available now to purchase in our online boutique

ARROW - Black Felt Rhinestone Arrow Brooch

Our ‘ ARROW ‘ Brooch is a unisex brooch handmade from luxurious velour felt

and hand cut into the perfect arrows shape with Sparkling Rhinestones.

Silver Metal pin in the back to attach it to your hat or jacket.

Perfect for a groom or a special event.

RODNEY MODELLING OUR ‘ ARROW ‘ RHINESTONE BROOCH

MERRY CHRISTMAS From The House Of Hats

Just wanted to wish you all a very Merry Christmas , Wow can you believe how fast has this year gone.
We've had a super busy year creating our new Sydney showroom and meeting some amazing new clients and existing ones.
We have some new arrivals just in time for the party season and lots more coming early next year so stay turned.
We are also now offering hat repairs and restorations so if you have a hat that needs so love you can send it our way to bring it back to life.
Thank you to every one of you who supports our small business it means the world to us, we are so proud to be Australian made & owned.
We are so looking forward to you all visiting our new showroom in 2023 , we have so many ideas in the works for the year ahead so it's going to be a fantastic year..

Wishing you all a very Safe  Merry Christmas & a Happy new year !!! 
Love your Milliner ..

See you all in 2023 !!

ilana x

One of my favourite Christmas Songs - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Gift Cards are now available to purchase

Behind The Scenes of our new Showroom

We have been super busy designing and renovating our new space and creating our beautiful new showroom.

Before our renovation

We started off with a blank canvas in this victorian room with stunning marble fireplace and ornate ceiling as our feature.

Black Feature Wall

We wanted to stick with my logo colours , so went with a black feature wall around the fireplace and light green walls.

The theme for the room was inspired by the old victorian millinery shops back in the 1900s , we already had this antique timber mirror but we jazzed it up by painted it gold and how spectacular does it look .

We managed to find an incredible antique 1920s copper & glass shop display counter which was the perfect fit in the middle of the room and we also found a antique velvet chaise lounge at an estate sale that fits in with the theme perfectly.

Willow modelling on our Antique Chaise

We painted our wooden hat stands gold to match our feature mirror.

Our Gold Wooden Hat Stands

We designed the shelf layout and found a local carpenter that custom made a cupboard and timber shelves built on both wall for hat display and hat box storage.

Design for Shelves

Finished Timber Shelves

We are now just in the final stages of finishing and are just waiting on curtains and another cabinet to be painted and we will be finished,

Stay tuned for the final reveal.

CHRYSALIS COLLECTION 2020

Emerge from the darkness into the light and be transformed back to the nostalgic sixties into a world of hypnotic colour and wonder.

The House Of Hats Summer Collection ' CHRYSALIS' let's you spread your wings and express your true self.

Enjoy the ' Fluttering' new Women’s Hat Collection with Sunshine, Daydreamer and Wonderland.

Taste our Summer Wine and let the butterfly within you fly.

Shop The House Of Hats New Millinery collection now with beautiful handcrafted couture hats and headpieces all one of kind. Perfect for the warmer summer months and all year round.

Handmade in our Sydney Studio

View The House Of Hats ' CHRYSALIS ' Full collection

The House Of Hats ‘ CHRYSALIS ‘ Collection offers you a wide variety of Hats, Headpieces and accessories.

Beautiful rich colours to turn heads and stand out from the crowd.

The House Of Hats couture Millinery all handmade in our Sydney Studio by milliner Ilana meilak.

The House Of Hats’ FOLK ‘ Hat collection offers you a range of beautiful high quality hand blocked straw Hats is a variety of colours.

Wide brimmed for maximum sun protection in the warmer days and detailed with hand embroidered raffia flowers.

‘ FOLK’ is a stunning everyday hat to brighten up your day.

A classic style hat that will last you years to come.

Shop our ‘ CHRYSALIS ‘ Collection now or contact us to create your very own custom made hat for any occasion made especially for you.

BIBA Fever back to 1969 London

Biba Fever 

Biba was a London fashion store of the 1960s and 1970s.  Biba was started and primarily run by  the Polish-born Barbara Hulanicki with help of her husband Stephen Fitz-Simon.

Biba's early years were rather humble, with many of the outfits being cheap and available to the public by mail order. Biba’s postal boutique had its first significant success in May 1964 when it offered a pink gingham dress with a hole cut out of the back of the neck with a matching triangular kerchief to readers of the Daily Mirror.  The dress had celebrity appeal, as a similar dress had been worn by Brigitte Bardot. By the morning after the dress was advertised in the Daily Mirror, over 4,000 orders had been received. Ultimately, some 17,000 outfits were sold.

Hulanicki worked as a fashion illustrator after studying at Brighton Art College inthe late 1950s. She married advertising executive Stephen Fitz-Simon and they soon opened a mail order clothing company that she named Biba's Postal Boutique. Biba was the nickname of her younger sister Biruta.

The first store, in Abingdon Road in Kensington was opened in September 1964.

Hulanicki’s first encounter with her new customers was at 10 o’clock on theSaturday morning it opened; "...the curtains were drawn across the window…the shop was packed with girls trying on the same brown pinstripe dress in concentrated silence. Not one asked if there were any other styles or sizes," Hulanicki remarked.

The brown pinstripe dresses were being stored in the shop because Hulanicki’s apartment was overflowing with boxes of clothes for their mail order service. Fitz-Simon dropped Hulanicki at the shop and went to pick up more dresses, Hulanicki went to the bathroom and when she came back the shop was packed. "The louder the music played the faster the girls moved and more people appeared in the shop. I had sold every dress by 11. After the last dress had been sold, people were still lining up inside waiting for the next delivery.

The shops' main appeal was what was seen on TV on Friday night could now be bought on Saturday and worn that night. As the Biba style (tight cut skinny sleeves, earthy colours) and logo became more and more recognisable, themore and more people wanted to be seen in it.

The second store at 19-21 Kensington Church Street opened in 1965 and a series of mail-order catalogues followed in 1968, which allowed customers to buy Biba style without having to come to London.

n 1973 with the backing of Dorothy Perkins and British Land , the store moved to the seven-storey Derry & Toms  department store, which immediately attracted up to a million customers weekly, making it one of the most visited tourist attractions in London.

There were different departments, and each floor had its own theme, such as a children's floor, a floor for men, a book store, a food market, and a "home" floor which sold items such as wallpaper, paint, cutlery, soft furnishings and even statues. The overall design was produced by Whitmore-Thomas Partnership, run by artist/designers Steve Thomas and Tim Whitmore.[Each department had its own logo or sign, which was based on the Biba logo and had a picture describing the department. These were commissioned by Thomas and Whitmore and designed by Kasia Charko.

The store had an Art Deco-interior reminiscent of the Golden Age of Hollywood. and non-traditional displays,  Barbara Hulanicki and her husband Simon Fitzsimon have spent £1m refurbishing the Art Deco department store - known as Big Biba - to house her idiosyncratic collection of clothes and accessories.

The Biba Food Hall was also designed ingeniously, each part being aimed at one particular kind of product; a unit made to look like a dog (based on Hulanicki's own dog, a Great Dane named Othello)  consisted of dog food; a huge baked beans tin can consisted of only tins of Baked beans; a can of "Warhol's  Condensed Soup" etc., all foods having individual innovative units. Also at the new "Big Biba" was "The Rainbow Restaurant", which was located on the fifth floor of the department store and was destined to become a major hang-out for rock stars, but which was not solely the reserve of the elite. With all of these renovations and additions, Biba became known as a "theatre for fashion."Also at the site was the Kensignton Roof Gardens  which are still there today.

The move to Derry and Toms in 1973 gave a much needed boost to other more conventional department stores in a lacklustre Kensington High Street suffering from recession.
Dorothy Perkins bought 75% of Biba taking it from a loss of £40,000 to a profit of £300,000.Biba was a victim of the same recession and only survived for two years before closing in 1975.

It seemed people wee happy to come and see the impressive decor and designer goods but were more reluctant to buy.

Barbara Hulanicki moved to Beazil in 1975 and in 1983 she published a book about the Biba enterprise called A to Biba in which she blamed British land forthe demise of the store by running it down to save other parts of its empire.

Twiggy Modelling for Biba 1971

Twiggy Modelling for Biba 1971