'Hats Off to Eugenia Kim'

Eugenia Kim and her collection of hats

Just when you thought that women’s hats were dépassé, along came Eugenia Kim.

Today, the milliner is the focus of Stylecaster video series titled “Stay Extroardinary,” which takes a look into the success story of the designer who put hats on the fashion radar.

Kim, 35, designs quirky hats in a variety of trendy styles, available in retail stores such as Barney’s New York, Neiman Marcus and Bloomingdales. Earlier this year, Kim partnered with Target to launch an affordable collection of hats inspired by ‘Old Cuba’ from the forties and fifties. Her fedoras and cloche hats have been spotted on all kinds of celebrities, from Jennifer Lopez and Britney Spears, to Paris Hilton and Gwyneth Paltrow.

Eugenia Kim SS10 Collection

Before all she "thought about and dreamt about were hats," Parsons School of Design alum Kim started out as an assistant at Allure magazine. Later fired from Allure and a victim of a bad haircut, Kim took decided to shave all her hair off. (Kim now credits the shaved head as her brand logo.) The designer took refuge underneath a feathery hat of her own creation.

Pretty soon, Kim had hat orders trilling in from New York based boutique Bond 07 after the store owner spotted her shopping in Soho, and after Barney’s New York viewed the hats in the Bond 07 shop window and wanted its own.

This was the start of the building of an empire.

Kim as seen on Stylecaster

An ‘East Village’ girl at heart, Kim reaches out to customers who have a bit of that downtown flare. Kim admits that she never ventures north of 14th Street in New York, with the exception of shopping trips to Barneys. Her hats reflect her hip personality, cleverly embellished with bows, prints and funky add-ons.

The designer admitted to New York Daily that she didn’t always dream of being a designer. Born into a family of doctors, Kim first studied medicine at Dartmouth. “Then I broke my back and was in the month for a hospital,” she said. “I thought, ‘This is so depressing, I don’t want to be a doctor.’”

Hats off to Kim for becoming a designer instead. Otherwise, what would I wear on my head?

-S. Gonzalez

*Photos courtesy of nydailynews.com; stylecaster.com