Dads have always been trendsetters, if mostly inadvertently. The use of “dad” as an adjective to label such trends is a relatively recent phenomenon.
Mackenzie Pearson is widely credited with pushing the phrase ‘dad bod’ into the zeitgeist after publishing an article entitled “Why Girls Love the Dad Bod” in 2015. Though she’s long openly stated that she didn’t coin the term for the article and merely repeated it.
More recently, New York Magazine’s The Cut published a year-in-review style summation titled “The Dad-ification of 2022 Fashion.“
It’s tricky, though, to find authoritative information on when the term “dad hat” started being used instead of, say, more generic terms like “baseball hat/cap.”
I’m sure a dissertation on the subject is out there somewhere. But one speculative answer I find personally convincing comes from Reddit user marcAnthem, who shared it on the r/streetwear subforum over eight years ago.
To paraphrase their take, the name took hold in streetwear because, at some point in the past, the only hats commonly discussed by that community were snapbacks and fitted caps.
So, as the unstructured, curved-billed hats worn often by middle-aged men started becoming in vogue, the community needed specific language to distinguish these newly trendy hats from other styles.
Soon, the dad hat shorthand evolved into a nod to the obvious.
The Dad Hat Gets the Todd Snyder Treatment
Transforming ordinary garments into luxurious staples is the biggest chapter in Todd Snyder’s design playbook. Traditionally, his process involves leveraging premium materials and tasteful yet still-of-the-moment neutral shades to create the ultimate version of a classic menswear garment.
He’s already done this plenty of times with hats too, most notably via his continued collaboration with New Era.
