The idea for this hat came to me in a dream, as do all the best ideas. I was taking a hike with Courtney Kelley and Kate Gagnon Osborn (of Kelbourne Woolens) while wearing it. They were championing their latest cause to me, a campaign to ‘Free Cecily’—fellow designer Cecily Glowik Macdonald, who had been “wrongfully accused and imprisoned for throwing rocks at schoolchildren.” As Kate so succinctly worded it, with the type of nonsense one only finds in dreams, “We know she didn’t do it, the children couldn’t even describe what type of earrings she had been wearing!”

When my coworkers stopped laughing the next morning, they told me to a) stop bringing my work home with me, and b) design this hat.

Designed to be unisex, the Free Cecily Hat features a short row brim to help cover up chilled ears and a slowly curving cable panel. An asymmetrical garter stitch flap is optional for a touch of whimsy or to showcase a favorite button.

Note: The men’s size with flap only uses a small portion of the 2nd skein.