Groyne

Groyne (pronounced groin)

A wall or jetty built out from a riverbank or seashore to control erosion; also known as a spur or breakwater, acting as a "strong, low sea wall".  The US spelling is for all purposes: groin.  The noun plural is groynes.

1580s: Origin contested, some sources claim it’s an alteration of groin, the use based on a vague anatomical similarity.  The alternative etymology, this one linked to porcine proboscis anatomy, traces the origin to the Middle English groyn (snout) from the Old French groign & groin (muzzle, snout; promontory, jutting part) from the Late Latin grunium & grunia, derived from the Classical Latin grunnire (grunt like a pig).  It has troubled etymologists because the use of groin in the sense of "pig's snout" from circa 1300 was obsolete long before the 1580s.  All agree however the link of the Latin and French forms to the colloquial English grunter (a pig).

Groynes are fixed hydraulic structure extending either from a costal shoreline or riverbank which interrupt the natural water-flow, thereby limiting the movement of sediment.  Historically, groynes were made from timber or stone but synthetic materials are now also used.  Ocean groynes tend towards being perpendicular to the shore, extending from the upper foreshore or beach into the water where as riparian structures are often laid at more acute angles.  Groynes may be wholly or partially submerged and the space between two is called a groyne field although they’re generally built in a series, often in tandem with seawalls.

English spelling evolved under many influences and this produced anomalies and absurdities, some of which the Americans corrected and it would be nice if the rest of the English-speaking world could be convinced to adopt the more rational of their innovations.  However, like cheque & check, groin (part of a body or vault) & groyne (a breakwater) share one pronunciation yet more than one meaning so maintaining two different spellings seems useful.  It's one of those examples where the often commendable simplification of US English is not helpful.

Wypipology

Wypipology (pronounced wahy-pee-pol-uh-jee)

A (usually darkly) humorous slang term for the (uncredentialed) branch of cultural anthropology in which a “researcher”, usually a person of color, “observes or studies” the behavior of wypipo (white people).

2017: The construct being wypipo (African-American slang for “white people” generally, especially those perceived to be racist, unaware of their own privilege, or engaging in cultural appropriation) based on African-American colloquial pronunciation of the phrase “white people”) + -ology (formed from -o- (as an interconsonantal vowel) +‎ -logy).  The origin in English of the -logy suffix lies with loanwords from the Ancient Greek, usually via Latin and French, where the suffix (-λογία) is an integral part of the word loaned (eg astrology from astrologia) since the sixteenth century.  French picked up -logie from the Latin -logia, from the Ancient Greek -λογία (-logía).  Within Greek, the suffix is an -ία (-ía) abstract from λόγος (lógos) (account, explanation, narrative), and that a verbal noun from λέγω (légō) (I say, speak, converse, tell a story).  In English the suffix became extraordinarily productive, used notably to form names of sciences or disciplines of study, analogous to the names traditionally borrowed from the Latin (eg astrology from astrologia; geology from geologia) and by the late eighteenth century, the practice (despite the disapproval of the pedants) extended to terms with no connection to Greek or Latin such as those building on French or German bases (eg insectology (1766) after the French insectologie; terminology (1801) after the German Terminologie).  Within a few decades of the intrusion of modern languages, combinations emerged using English terms (eg undergroundology (1820); hatology (1837)).  In this evolution, the development may be though similar to the latter-day proliferation of “-isms” (fascism; feminism et al).  The alternative spelling is wipipology, a practitioner in the discipline is thus a wypipologist or wipipologist.

Michael Harriot, world-renowned wypipologist.

Technically, wypipology is a back-formation from wypipologist, the term coined by journalist Michael Harriot (b 1972), formerly a contributor to the Black-focused website theroot.com and still writing for certain mainstream publications such as the Guardian.  Mr Harriot appears first to have used the word on-line in 2017 although there are unattested references to instances of use in 2016; in his self-edited biographical note on the Root website, Mr Harriot describes himself as a “world-renowned wypipologist.”  The core of wypipology lies in creating something of a parody of (what to some extent may itself be a caricature) the manner in which generations of white cultural anthropologists and sociologists used a language of “otherness” to describe Black societies, contrasting the civilized (white) cultures with those of the Blacks which were characterized variously as uncivilized, primitive, backward, savage etc.

Due for publication in January 2023, Michael Harriot says his Black AF History: The Un-Whitewashed Story of America (HarperCollins, 288 pp, ISBN:0358439167) will be a comprehensive appraisal of American history in which the dominant narrative is directly confronted and corrected to showcase the perspectives and experiences of Black Americans.

The point was not that white sub-cultures weren’t studied or observed; indeed, in the era of massive growth in sociology during the post-war years, many sub-sets of white society, divided across many lines, were the subject of many studies.  However, just as Edward Said (1935-2003) in Orientalism (1978) created a critique of the (Western) field of Oriental Studies in which he deconstructed the distorted cultural representations which he claimed were the product of centuries of Eurocentric prejudice against what lies east and south of Suez, Hariott identified the prevalent white attitude as one of cultural insularity which, combined with a feeling of superiority to non-whites, meant the prevailing attitude could be only inherently racist and oblivious to their multi-layered privileges of whiteness.  One advantage of Hariott’s wypipology was that it was couched in the style of darkly absurdist humor, not something that could be said of Said’s inch-thick polemic and the instances cited by an observant wypipologist might range from the ridiculous to the deadly.  In recent years, theroot has given awards to the white folks thought to have committed the most egregious offences but there were none in 2021, perhaps because Mr Hariott ceased his association.  

Variations on the idea of subverting the constructs of white civilization and their comparison with Black backwardness have often used the language of cultural anthropology and sociology to make the point: 

The fictitious tribe Nacirema ("American" spelled backwards) was first described in a satire of academic anthropology in the June 1956 edition of American Anthropologist and is still used in universities to demonstrate to students the extent to which they are racially pre-conditioned.  In a passage describing seemingly ritualistic practices involving cleaning the mouth, because it's written in a style usually associated with that detailing the practices of pre-modern people, most students when asked, associate it with Black people gathered in a clearing in the jungle.  It's actually a description of 1950s middle-class white Americans brushing their teeth.

Babakiueria (1986) (released on VHS Tape & DVD as Babakiueria (Barbeque Area)) was a satire in which the history of a white invasion of an indigenous nation was reversed.  The events stayed much the same, only the colors were changed.

The 1992 Austrian film Das Fest des Huhnes (The festival of the chicken) was a presentation of the customs and lifestyles of the "native peoples" of Upper Austria, described by a team of Black African anthropologists, using the language and style of white anthropologists.

Collar

Collar (pronounced kol-er)

(1) The part of a shirt, coat, dress, blouse, etc that encompasses the neckline of the garment and is sewn permanently to it, often so as to fold or roll over.

(2) A similar but separate, detachable article of clothing worn around the neck or at the neckline of a garment.

(3) Anything worn or placed around the neck.

(4) In law enforcement, a slang term for securing an arrest.

(5) In metalworking, a piece rolled to wrap itself around a roller.

(6) In biology, a marking or structure resembling a collar, such as that found around the necks of some birds.

(7) In engineering, a section of a shaft or rod having a locally increased diameter to provide a bearing seat or a locating ring

(8) In butchery, a cut of meat, especially bacon, from the neck of an animal.

(9) In ancient chivalric orders, a symbol of membership.

(10) In jewelry, an ornament for the neck, a variant of which is the choker.

(11) In rehabilitative medicine, a device worn around the neck to support the head.

(12) In architecture, a variety of beams and ties which are structural elements in roof framing between rafters.

(13) In baseball, a slang term for a player getting no hits in a game.

(14) In plumbing, a type of sleeve used to join two tubes.

(15) In industrial power generation, a piece of hardware used on power transmission devices as a mechanical stop, locating device, or bearing face.

(16) In the profession of the hangman, the knot of the noose (archaic).

(17) In extractive underground mining, a curb or a horizontal timbering around the mouth of a shaft.

(18) In botany, the neck or line of junction between the root of a plant and its stem.

(19) A ring-like part of a mollusk in connection with the esophagus.

(20) In nautical architecture, an eye formed in the bight or bend of a shroud or stay to go over the masthead; also, a rope to which certain parts of rigging, as dead-eyes, are secured.

(21) In financial market jargon, a trading strategy using options in a ways that there exists both an upper limit on profit and a lower limit on loss, constructed through taking equal but opposite positions in put and call options with different strike prices.

1250–1300: From the Middle English coler from the Anglo-French colier & Old French coler, derived from the Latin collāre (neckband, collar), the construct being coll (truncation of collum (neck)) + āre (neuter (as noun) suffix of āris).  Ultimate source was the primitive Indo-European kwol(o) (neck) which entered both the Old Norse and the Middle Dutch as hals (neck), literally "that on which the head turns" from the root kwel (move round, turn about).

The meaning "border at the neck of a garment” emerged in the fourteenth century and all meanings since are in some way analogous.  Collier exists in Modern French, again from the Latin; cognate with the Gothic hals, the Old English heals and the Spanish cuello.

Collars

Noted for slogans rather than imaginative linguistic flourishes, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison (b 1968; Australian prime-minister since 2018), a confessed meat-eater, was so shocked at the tactics some rabid vegans had used to disrupt the slaughter industry's supply chains, he was moved to describe the protesters, inter alia, as “green-collar criminals”.  He’d likely have preferred to label them eco-terrorists and have them locked-up somewhere but may have been advised that might be unlawful or at least hyperbolic.  Interestingly the phrase “green-collar crime” is used both to describe some of the actions of activists and the environmental damage against which they’re protesting; it’s not clear which meaning will prevail and it's an amusing if confusing co-existence.

It’s among the most recent of the “collar” words, all variations of the old white-blue collar delineation (except the ecclesiastical dog collar which is from the nineteenth century).  Blue collar worker was used first in 1924 to describe the working class, an allusion to the hard-wearing blue denim they stereotypically wore.  White-collar worker was coined in the 1930s by US writer Upton Sinclair (1878–1968) in connection with those absorbed in clerical, administrative and managerial functions.  Used mostly in economics and sociology, the collars have been handy (if imprecise) definitional shorthand in both academic and other writing.

Blue collar:  Originally, a member of the working class who performs manual work and earns either an hourly wage or is paid a piece rate.  The labor market in recent decades has changed so much that for economists it may now be a useless or al least misleading term although culturally, it is still of real utility.   

White collar:  Historically, salaried professionals, office workers and management; ie clean, safe jobs in pleasant physical environments although for many, salaries were low.

Pink collar: Now probably obsolete, it described a member of the working class in the service industry in occupations such as waiters and retail or other roles involving relations with people.  Origin of the term was the need to describe the rapidly expanding employment in service industries during the 1990s and its overwhelmingly female demographic.  Now treated as sexist, there were suggestions it could morph into something gender-neutral but it didn’t work as well and is now close to extinct although the companion pink collar crime endures and remains a descriptor of white collar crimes committed by women where the loot stolen is of relatively low-value.

Gold collar:  A highly skilled multi-disciplinarian who combines the intellectual and practical skills of both white & blue collar employees.

Red collar:  Government workers of all types.  In China, it refers also to Communist Party officials working in private companies, the implication being they’re placed there for some party purpose; similar in both function and ultimate purpose but different in ideology to the old party commissars.  

Grey collar: Skilled technicians, typically someone whose role is a mix of white and blue collar (although some say the distinction between grey and gold is a bit vague; notion is that gold are higher paid than grey).  Like gold, grey collar is a recent invention which seems not to have caught on; both may die out.

New collar:  Jobs said to require the technical and soft skills needed to work with contemporary technology industry; often associated with a non-traditional education path.  Cynics suggest it’s there to describe university drop-outs whose start-ups work out ok.

Happy times in dog collars.  Cardinal George Pell (1941-2023, left) with his predecessor as Archbishop of Melbourne, Sir Frank Little (1925–2008, right).

Dog collar:  Christian clergy (although, technically, only a sub-set of the whole); now rarely seen outside of churches and courtrooms.  In the public consciousness, such is the association of the male clergy with pedophilia that the clergy, when out and about, usually do so in disguise (mufti).  That's actually not new.  One of the (many) reasons Jesuit priests were once so mistrusted was that they tended not to wear clerical garb, claiming the wearing of everyday clothes permitted them to be closer to the people.  Actually, it was just a trick so they could spy on them.

No collar:  Artists, the precariously employed and others who tend to privilege passion and personal growth over financial gain.

Orange collar:  Prison laborers, named for the orange jumpsuits most associated with inmates in the US prison system.

Green collar:  Workers in a wide range of professions relating to the environment and renewable energy.  Confusingly, green collar crime is used by both sides to describe the actions of their opponents in that activists refer to those accused of causing environmental damage as green collar criminals whereas the slaughter industry uses the same label for the radical vegans who disrupt their production or distribution.

Scarlet collar:  Prostitutes and ancillary staff (brothel receptionists et al included in an example of the way the "collar" labels are sometimes applied to industry sectors as well as specific occupations).

Black collar:  Originally used to describe manual laborers in jobs when workers habitually become very dirty although it has been extended to those working in the illicit black economy.  Of late it’s been applied also to (1) the pro-gun movement in the US, (2) artists who have adopted black clothing by choice and (3) those in insecure, low-paid employment.  The meaning may now be too diluted to be of much use.

Virtual collar:  Robots performing manual repetitive tasks, both physical and virtual but has been used also to describe the cheap, mobile technology capital uses as a tool of control.

Rainbow collar:  Workers in industries which serve or are most identified with the LGBTQQIAAOP community.  This was once a largely volunteer movement but increasing has a paid-labor component.  The adjectival rainbow, in polite society, has now wholly supplanted pink (eg the earlier pink dollar), partly because of the historical use of pink labels or descriptors by repressive régimes.  Pink collar was never linked with the LGBTQQIAAOP community and the earlier lavender collar enjoyed only a brief linguistic career.

Lindsay Lohan in army green, fur-collared jacket over blouse with metal studded collar, New York, March 2014.

Dominion

Dominion (pronounced duh-min-yon)

(1) The power or right of governing and controlling; sovereign authority.

(2) Rule; control; domination; predominance; ascendancy.

(3) A territory, usually of considerable size, in which a single ruler-ship holds sway (used sometimes figuratively).

(4) Lands or domains subject to sovereignty or control.

(5) In political science, a territory constituting a self-governing commonwealth and being one of a number of such territories united in a community of nations, or empire.  Formerly applied to self-governing former colonies of the British Empire; Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and later, others.

(6) In law, a rare (probably archaic) alternative spelling of dominium.

(7) In taxonomy, kingdom.

(8) A specialized classification in theology; in biblical scholarship, an order of angel in Christian angelology, ranked above virtues and below thrones.

Mid 1400s: From the Middle English dominion (lordship, sovereign or supreme authority), from the Middle & Old French dominion (rule, power), from the Medieval Latin dominionem (nominative dominio) or dominium (lordship, right of ownership), from dominus (lord, master), corresponding to dominium (property, ownership) from domus (house) from the primitive Indo-European root dem (house, household).  The meaning "territory or people subject to a specific government” dates from the 1510s, the specific legal meaning at law “power of control, right of uncontrolled possession, use, and disposal" was codified by the 1650s.  In law, dominion was used from the 1510s to refer to (a territory or people subject to a specific government or control) and in the law of real property, from the 1650s assumed the meaning "power of control, right of uncontrolled possession, use, and disposal".

British sovereign colonies often were called dominions, hence the Dominion of Canada, the formal title after the 1867 union, Dominion Day, the Canadian national holiday in celebration of the union, and “Old Dominion”, the popular name for the US state of Virginia, first recorded 1778.  Dominions are best remembered as the quasi-independent nations under the British Crown, constituting the part of the British Empire best remembered as “the white dominions” or, later, “the white commonwealth”.  Canada was the first, declared in 1867 and Australia, New Zealand, Newfoundland and South Africa followed.  Later additions included the Irish Free State and the states of the old Raj, India, East and West Pakistan, and Ceylon.  The Balfour (Arthur Balfour (later Lord Balfour), 1848–1930, UK prime-minister 1902-1905; Lord President of the Council 1925-1929) Declaration of 1926 recognized the United Kingdom and the Dominions to be "...autonomous Communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown, and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations." and the Statute of Westminster (1931), in what was the first general enactment for the constitution of the British Empire since Lord North's (later Lord Guilford, 1732–1792; GB prime-minister 1770-1782) regulating act of 1778, granted them what was close to legislative independence.

The word dominion was earlier used to refer to a geographically-defined political entity without legal status mentioned above.  Wales was thus described between 1535-1801 and New England between 1686-1689.  It was also the popular name for the US state of Virginia, the use first recorded in 1778.  While never bothering fully to define the status, the covenant of the League of Nations made provision for the admission of any “fully self-governing state, Dominion, or Colony”, the implication being that Dominion status was something between that of a colony and a state.  That certainly reflected British Empire practice.

Flag of Canada, adopted 1965.

Canada, officially still uses the title though it’s now merely historical with no constitutional effect, the most obvious residual effect the annual "Canada Day" national holiday (1 July) in celebration of the 1867 act of union which some older folk still refer to as "Dominion Day", the official title until 1982.  Prior to the act of union, the idea of a confederation comprising the colonies of British North America had been for some time discussed and on 1 July 1867, the Imperial Parliament created such a dominion by passing into law the British North America Act which joined the then defined territories of Upper and Lower Canada, New Brunswick & Nova Scotia.  In a typically British colonial "fix", the act created the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, the latter to accommodate the French-speaking minority there clustered and made further provisions for other colonies and territories in future to join the dominion.  It was on this constitutional framework that Canada evolved into its present form, the next major event in 1982 when the structurally significant (though by most barely noticed) Canada Act was passed which included the symbolically notable word "patriation" apparently a prime-ministerial invention by Lester B Pearson (1897–1972; Canadian prime minister 1963-1968) who in 1966 coined the term as a as a back-formation from repatriation (returning to a country of origin).

Canada, officially still uses the title “Dominion of Canada”, though it’s now merely historical with no constitutional effect, the most obvious residual effect the annual "Canada Day" national holiday (1 July) in celebration of the 1867 act of union which some older folk still refer to as "Dominion Day", the official title until 1982.  Prior to the act of union, the idea of a confederation comprising the colonies of British North America had been for some time discussed and on 1 July 1867, the Imperial Parliament created the dominion by passing into law the British North America Act (1967) which joined the then defined territories of Upper and Lower Canada, New Brunswick & Nova Scotia.  In a typically British colonial "fix", the act created the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, the latter to accommodate the French-speaking minority there clustered and made further provisions for other colonies and territories in future to join the dominion.

It was on this constitutional framework that Canada evolved into its present form, the next structural event in 1982 when the significant (though by most barely noticed) Canada Act was passed which included the symbolically notable word "patriation" apparently a prime-ministerial invention by Lester B Pearson (1897–1972; Canadian prime minister 1963-1968) who in 1966 coined the term as a back-formation from repatriation (returning to a country of origin).  In this context the difference between "patriation" & “repatriation” was merely political, lawyers agreeing there was no technical point to be argued but as a symbolic gesture, it appealed to politicians who wished to make the point that the Canadian constitution was, for the first time, fully to be in Canadian hands.  Prior to the 1982 act, the process to amend the constitution required the parliament in Ottawa to request the parliament in Westminster to give effect to the change; the United Kingdom assembly thus still functioning as an imperial parliament.  This was the arrangement which prevailed upon the granting of dominion statue in 1867 and while the 1931 Statute of Westminster (limiting the circumstances win which the British Parliament's could legislate for Canada) and the 1949 British North America (No 2) Act (granting the (federal) parliament in Ottawa significant authority to amend the constitution) did render Canada de facto independence, the device of needing to refer major amendments to London remained.

The retention of this authority in London was not the choice of the colonial oppressors, successive British governments having offered to expedite any (patriative or repatriative as preferred; repatriate from the Latin repatriare, the construct being re- (back, backwards, again) + patria (homeland) and cognate to repair (to return)) request from the Canadian parliament, but rather the inability of the politicians in Ottawa to secure the agreement of the politicians in Quebec City about the exact model of any locally-held authority.  In one of the charming quirks which emerged as the decolonization processes of the twentieth century unfolded, the view, rightly or wrongly, of the French-speaking politicians in Quebec was that the UK politicians would be less likely to make changes disadvantageous to them than would other Canadian politicians.

In the end, despite decades of discussion, debate and dissent, unanimous agreement between the federal and provincial governments proved impossible to secure and it was announced by Ottawa that regardless of that, the request would be made unilaterally to patriate the constitution from Britain.  Several provinces challenged that in the Supreme Court of Canada but the judges (in something of an echo of the prevailing view about the circumstance of the 1975 dismissal of an Australian prime-minister in 1975) ruled that provincial consent was not a legal necessity although “substantial consent” by the provincial assemblies was a longstanding constitutional convention.  As it turned out, with a small legislative tweak, the Canadian prime-minister was able to obtain the agreement of nine of the ten provinces, thereby presumably satisfying both spirit and letter.

In Westminster, a few MPs took advantage of the situation to do a bit of virtue-signaling and generally practice the politics of “warm inner glow” by voting against the Canada Act (1982) claiming to be concerned about Canada’s prior treatment of Quebec and its indigenous peoples.  The UK government however, although concerned about a couple of technical points, quickly passed the act and from that point, Canada became wholly independent, the position of Queen Elizabeth II as head of state an entirely personal relationship with the Canadian government with no connection to the government of the UK.  Presumably to try to show the people of Canada something had happened, the name of the Dominion Day national holiday was changed to Canada Day.

King George V with prime ministers at the 1926 Imperial Conference. Back row: WS Monroe (Newfoundland), JG Coates (New Zealand), SM Bruce (Australia), JBM Hertzog (South Africa) and WT Cosgrave (Irish Free State).  Front row: Stanley Baldwin (United Kingdom), King George V, Mackenzie King (Canada).

Creating some confusion, which they seem often to have enjoyed, the Colonial Office referred to all the Empire’s possessions as dominions (with a small d) while those with a capital D were the Dominions (Australia, NZ et al) proper.  Thus all Dominions were dominions but not all dominions were Dominions.  How the Foreign Office must have envied the pedantry.  

Dylan Thomas’ poem And Death Shall Have No Dominion recalls Romans 6:9 (King James translation) “death hath no more dominion”.

And death shall have no dominion.
Dead man naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.
 
And death shall have no dominion.
Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;
Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;
Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;
Split all ends up they shan't crack;
And death shall have no dominion.
 
And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Though they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion.

Guggenhat

Guggenhat (pronounced goo-gin-hat)

1960: The construct was Guggen(heim) + hat.  Solomon Guggenheim (1861–1949) was a US businessman and art collector who in 1939 established the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, best known for the Guggenheim Museum in Manhattan, NYC, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and opened in 1960.  Hat (a shaped covering for the head, usually with a crown and brim, especially for wear outdoors) was pre-900, from the Middle English hat, from the Old English hætt (head-covering, hat) (variously glossing the Latin pileus, galerus, mitra & tiara), from the Proto-Germanic hattuz (hat, hood, cowl), from the primitive Indo-European kad- (to guard, cover, care for, protect).  It was cognate with the North Frisian hat (hat), the Danish hat (hat), the Swedish hatt (hat), the Icelandic hattur (hat), the Latin cassis (helmet), the Lithuanian kudas (bird's crest or tuft), the Avestan xaoda (hat), the Persian خود‎ (xud) (helmet), the Welsh cadw (to provide for, ensure) and the Old Norse hattr &  hǫttr (cap, cowl, hood).  The Proto-Germanic hattuz is of uncertain etymology although etymologists have suggested a link with the Lithuanian kuodas (tuft or crest of a bird) and Latin cassis (helmet), the latter thought perhaps more persuasive although most maintain the source of this was Etruscan.

Sally Victor's Airwave hat created for Mamie Eisenhower (1896–1979; first lady of the United States 1953-1961) to wear at her husband's (Dwight Eisenhower (1890-1969) US president 1953-1961) inauguration.  The shape reflected the influence Ms Victor noted that wartime advances in aerodynamics and the increased understanding of fluid dynamics had had on many aspects of the built environment and industrial design.

Sally Victor (1905–1977) was a US milliner active between 1928-1967 who supplied both celebrities as well as the first ladies of both the Eisenhower (1953-1961) and Kennedy (1961-1963) White Houses and in a tactic that was used by the manufacturers of many products, while maintaining the exclusivity of her signature lines, she also sold mass-market ranges under the name Sally V.  Although her designs borrowed from the history of fashion, Sally Victor was interesting in that she was inspired not only by various traditions from the visual arts of many cultures but also industrial influences such as machinery, military vehicles and, most memorably, modernist architecture.  Unlike many designers serving the upper reaches of the market, even before such things became fashionable in the post-war world, she was never reticent in using synthetic materials in her hats, valuing the novel possibilities in shape and rigidity they afforded compared to the usual felts and silks of the time.

The Gugenhat and the Guggenheim, 1960.

Her most famous hat, known informally as the “gugenhat” was based on one of the landmarks of modernism, the Solomon R Guggenheim Museum (usually styled "the Guggenheim") on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue, designed by US architect Frank Lloyd Wright (1867–1959).  Solomon Robert Guggenheim (1861–1949) was an American businessman and art collector who in 1939 established the Solomon R Guggenheim Foundation.  Although his early interest in art had been in the works of the old masters, in the 1920s his attention switched to modern art, then a fashionable if not entirely respectable cult and it was in this field that he decided to specialize.  Initially, his collection was private with the occasional public exhibition but in 1939, he took the lease on a space in New York City and opened a public gallery, the Museum of Non-Objective Painting.  The size of the collection grew rapidly, in part because of the large numbers of modern works becoming suddenly available because of Adolf Hitler's (1889-1945, Führer (leader) of Nazi Germany 1933-1945) distaste for "modern art", an attitude the Nazi's imposed not only on the German state but also the territories in occupied Europe.  While the Nazis didn't want the works seen in any place under their control, they were pragmatic about them being sold for hard currency.  So large did Guggenheim's collection of the avant-garde become that in 1943, Frank Lloyd Wright was commissioned to design a dedicated structure which would become a permanent exhibition space, his remit including the stipulation that in addition to being a practical, function building, it should reflect also the nature of the contents.  Guggenheim died in 1949 and in 1952 the museum was renamed the Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, the new building opening in 1959.

Lindsay Lohan at Lady Gaga's (b 1986) Fame Eau de Parfum launch party, Guggenheim Museum, New York, 13 September 2012.

The Guggenheim Museum, Manhattan, NYC.

The building was not without its critics and it’s true that the architect did seem to be uncompromising in maintain the integrity of the interior design, even if that meant imposing inherent limitations of the size and shape of what could be displayed.  Despite that, as a building it has aged well and has for decades exerted an influence which is still not spent although few who have since done art galleries have seemed anxious to be seen to be following in the footsteps.  In the 1990s, the building was extended, most impressed with how sympathetically the new was interpolated into the existing structure although the usual suspects objected, maintaining that given its historical significance, it should have been maintained in its original form.

Hat (left), designed in silk by Cristóbal Balenciaga (1895-1872) and made for Eisa (Spain) in 1962.  It evokes the spirals used by French architect Emilio Terry (1890-1969) in his Spiral house (1930) (centre) and later picked up by Philip Johnson (1906-2005) for his Church of Thanks-Giving, Dallas, Texas (1977) (right), inspired by the Great Mosque in Samarra, Iraq which itself borrowed from the square, spiral Pillar of Gor in Persia.

Nor, in 1960, was the Guggenhat a novel concept, artists and others long having been playing with the idea of the motifs of architecture being applied to hats, clothing and shoes, among the milliners the Eifel Tower, once a popular model.  Among curators, the trend had been noted and in 1954, New York’s Museum of Modern Art commissioned Sidney Peterson to direct Architectural Millinery, a short film (seven minutes duration) comparing the tops of New York skyscrapers with the styles of hats and there was a reason it wasn’t a feature-length production: To design a hat which displays the recognizable influence of an architectural style or a particular building while being both wearable and aesthetically successful is difficult.  In that sense Ms Victor choose well because the New York Guggenheim was an example of a building which might well have been inspired by a hat and such structures are rare.  Other buildings, however admired for their other qualities don’t offer milliners quite so obvious a blueprint.

Guggenheim Museum Bilbao.

The Guggenheim Museum in Abando, Bilbao, in Spain’s Basque Country, was designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry (b 1929) and opened in 1997 to almost universal acclaim from architects and it’s certainly eye-catching, even if one suspects comrade Stalin might have thought Gehry’s pencil drifted a little towards “formalism”.  Still, despite the odd back-handed compliment from a curmudgeon who found the lines “a fine example of modern art”, few in the last quarter-century seem to have revised their opinions although there have been criticisms of the internal dimensions which, unlike the Guggenheim in Manhattan will certainly accommodate large installations, some suggesting such art is prevalent enough without encouraging more.  Those who thought smaller pieces somehow suffered diminishment by being dwarfed by the enveloping space just don’t get the implications of art.

It could be done although there would be many who would say it shouldn't be done: The Guggenhat (Bilbao), a three-piece installation (digitally altered image).  Stranger stuff has been seen on catwalks but the Bilbao Guggenheim, as a whole, doesn’t lend itself to being rendered as a hat though in fairness to the architect, that’s not something likely to have piqued his interest.  The various interesting bits of the building might make several different hats but to get the effect, one would presumably need models walking carefully and closely in formation.

Even the Sydney Opera House (built between 1959-1973), perhaps more obviously geometrically promising (in millinery terms) has yet to inspire anything truly memorable although some kitsch (intended and not) shows up from time to time.

Zaha Hadid Architects' H-Line Hat for the Friends of the High Line, New York.

The motifs can however be separated from the whole.  Zaha Hadid Architects' H-Line Hat for the Friends of the High Line, New York was created in 2018 as part of a project to encourage architectural millinery based on the H-Line, an abandoned freight rail line which community action turned into a into a vibrant public park when the historic structure was under the threat of demolition.  Named (in a perhaps unimaginative but certainly simple piece of product association) the H-Line hat, the design was rendered in dégradé colors, the white melting into an electric blue around a brim the color of the sky and was inspired by an eleven storey residential building, the first project by Zaha Hadid Architects in New York and located near the High Line.  The hand-fixed steel façade of the building features a series of interlocking chevrons, steel bands and rounded corners, all evocative of Chelsea's industrial past and the decorative curves of the H-Line hat echoes these chevrons, weaving in open and closed forms around the wearer.