World’s first hat upcycled from used plastic umbrellas

In Japan, when you get caught in a sudden rain, you can easily find an inexpensive plastic umbrella at any convenience store. They usually cost between 100 to 500 yen. If the rain stops on your way home, you may accidentally leave the umbrella somewhere. However, you probably won’t mind because cheap plastic umbrellas have a disposable feel to them.

The annual consumption of umbrellas in Japan is estimated to be 120-130 million, according to the Japan Umbrella Promotion Association. It’s said that approximately 60% are plastic umbrellas, and many of them go to waste. Even if someone hands a plastic umbrella into the police as lost property, nobody usually comes to claims it.

Plastic umbrellas are actually water-resistant, a feature that outperforms their disposable nature. Taking advantage of this, a group of hat makers in Japan has created a hat from recycled plastic umbrellas called the Umbrella Bucket Hat. They developed a new original hat that boasts excellent strength and water resistance by pressing together layers of plastic taken from wasted umbrellas. By wearing it, you can keep your head dry without the need for an umbrella, and you can easily wipe it down when it gets dirty. Each handmade hat is different from the previous one made, as it depends on the combination and the condition of the used plastic umbrellas.

The group collects the used plastic umbrellas from stations or shopping facilities where they were left and scheduled to be disposed of. Each umbrella has a different structure, so they need to disassemble the canopies from the umbrella’s ribs and wash the plastic by hand. The size and thickness of the plastic awnings are different from umbrella to umbrella, and the material is not uniform. Therefore, when pressing the plastic sheets together, they adjust the temperature and pressure while checking the condition of each sheet. When sewing the hats, they do so in a detailed and careful manner, and they increase the stitching in certain places to strengthen the areas where the weight of the plastic is applying the most pressure.

PLASTICITY, the company that co-developed the umbrella hat, produces and sells various types of bags made from used plastic umbrellas, in addition to the hats. They position themselves as “a brand that should disappear in 10 years”, with the hope that the materials used to make the umbrellas will eventually become unavailable as society puts more focus on sustainability.

The issue of umbrella waste is gaining more attention, and an umbrella sharing service called Ikasa is becoming more popular, especially in urban areas. There are umbrella stations at places such as train stations, and you can rent an umbrella for a low as 70 yen for 24 hours. With the spread of these services and changes in consumer awareness, the hope is that disposable umbrellas will disappear someday in the future. At that time, Umbrella Bucket Hats will no longer be a thing, as they represent the present-day situation where we still live with a culture of disposable items. How about using one of these hats for this year’s rainy season?