No one should face
the world bareheaded.

The Katell Flannigan Top Hat Foundation provides top hats to people in need.

Give a top hat Volunteer
Katell Flannigan, in a green apron, presents a new black silk top hat to a recipient on a city sidewalk Distribution DayKatell Flannigan presents recipient #40,112 with their first top hat

Winter Appeal

This winter, 40,000 Americans will go without a top hat

24,410 hats funded of 40,000 goal

Give now
Katell Flannigan inspecting tall shelves of top hats in the Foundation's warehouse

Inside our Distribution Center

Every hat is inspected, brushed and fitted by hand before it reaches someone who needs it

Our 60,000-square-foot facility holds the nation’s largest reserve of donated top hats, sorted by size, height and level of shine. Our founder still inspects every shelf personally. Volunteer shifts are available seven days a week. Formal attire is encouraged but not required.

Volunteer with us

The problem

The Top Hat Gap

A century ago, the top hat was a fixture of American life. Today, fewer than one in two hundred adults owns one. Our research shows top hat ownership has been halving roughly every sixteen years since 1940, and that without intervention, the last privately owned top hat in America will be lost by 2051.

Read the report Close the gap

Our Programs

From fittings to our winter drive, every program has one goal: a top hat on every head that wants one, and several that didn’t know they did.

View all programs
Katell Flannigan measuring a recipient's head with a tailor's tape at a folding table of hat boxes

$18,450

74% of $25,000 · 310 donors

Fittings for All

A top hat that doesn’t fit is just a tall problem. Every recipient is measured by a trained volunteer, twice.

Donate
Katell Flannigan handing out top hats from a wooden crate on a snowy street

$61,040

61% of $100,000 · 530 donors

Winter Hat Drive

A silk top hat provides almost no warmth. It provides something better. Help us reach 40,000 heads before the first snow.

Donate
A recipient standing proudly in a new black silk top hat

$41,206

82% of $50,000 · 1,204 donors

Mobile Hat Unit

Our van brings top hats directly to neighborhoods where the nearest haberdasher is more than an hour away, which is all of them.

Donate

About the Foundation

The Katell Flannigan Top Hat Foundation was founded on a simple belief: a top hat is not a luxury. It is a statement that you are here, that you matter, and that you are approximately eight inches taller than you were a moment ago.

Since our founding, we have distributed more than 40,000 top hats in 31 states, staffed entirely by volunteers and funded entirely by people who believe everyone deserves a sense of occasion.

40,112

top hats distributed

31

states served

7⅛

most requested size

0

fedoras, ever

Recipient #40,112 wearing their new black silk top hat

Recipient story

Meet recipient #40,112

When our team met them in August, they had never owned a top hat. Not a borrowed one, not a costume one, not even a small novelty one on a headband. “I just didn’t think it was for people like me,” they told us.

Katell fitted them personally: a size 7⅛ black silk topper with a grosgrain band. They now report standing up straighter, being noticed in rooms, and, on one occasion, being mistaken for the owner of a restaurant.

Give someone their first top hat

Ways to Give

However you choose to give, your support puts a top hat on someone who needs one.

100% of every gift goes to hats.

Our administrative costs are covered by a separate fund, a generous board, and a single very old top hat that we pass around at meetings.

ONE-TIMEGive a top hat to someone in need todayMost popular MONTHLYJoin the Brim Circle with a monthly giftOne hat a month, every month SPONSOR A HEADSponsor one person’s top hat for life, including resizingYou’ll receive a photo and a thank-you card Planned GivingLeave a top hat in your willIt will outlive you, if brushed regularly Donate a HatGently used top hats accepted at all locationsNo fedoras, bowlers or trilbies, please matchingDouble your gift through your employer’s matching programTwo hats for the price of one

Give a top hat

Frequency

Amount

This site does not accept money and will never ask for payment details.

What your gift does

  • $25 provides one silk hatband and a lint brush.
  • $100 puts one new top hat on one head, fitted.
  • $250 provides a top hat, a fitting, a hat box and a short lesson on tipping it.
  • $2,500 covers an entire family, including the dog.
  • $1 million builds one top hat so tall it requires a permit.

Our Principles

Ten things we believe about top hats, and about people.

Katell Flannigan in the press

October 6, 2026The Milliner’s Gazette September 18, 2026HATS WEEKLY August 30, 2026Brim July 2, 2026Topper Today May 11, 2026THE SILKREVIEW April 1, 2026The Daily Brim February 9, 2026CROWN December 15, 2025Haberdasher October 3, 2025MILLINERY NOW March 21, 2024Felt
View all press coverage

Stories

A letter from our founder

October 14, 2026 · Katell Flannigan, Founder & President

When I started this Foundation, people asked me: why top hats? Why not food, or shelter, or something you can wear in the rain? My answer was simple. Other people are already doing those things, and doing them very well. Nobody was doing top hats.

Every day, millions of Americans walk out the door bareheaded. They go to work, they go to the store, they go to their cousin’s wedding, and nobody stops them to say, “Excuse me, where is your top hat?” Think about that. Could you live like that?

I believe in a country where anyone, from any background, can look in the mirror and see a person in a top hat. With your help, that country is within reach.

“I didn’t know I needed a top hat until I had one. Now I can’t remember who I was before.”

Recipient, Cleveland, Ohio

“People hold doors for me now. Taller doors, mostly.”

Recipient, Tucson, Arizona

“I volunteer every Saturday. Last week I fitted a man for his first top hat and we both cried a little.”

Volunteer since 2019