A guide to buying the right hat for your face shape.
Is your face oval, round, or oblong shaped? Or is it more like a heart, square, or kite (diamond)? Confused and not sure what hat best suits your shape? Whilst it may be the case that not every hat will suit every face shape, we’re big believers that no matter what nature’s gift – there is a beautiful hat out there for you. That’s why we’ve taken the time to compile a list, so that you come away with a hat that you love and cherish, and that accentuates your natural features.
Sometimes it can be tricky to decide on a hat. With it comes a myriad of decisions on colour, size, material and style. We think that the best way to help with these decisions is to take the natural shape of your face into account. The difference in the shapes of all of our faces is an astounding and wonderful reminder of the variety of beauty in the world, but a little bit of consideration of your face shape is helpful when making a beanie purchase. That’s why we’ve created a quick guide to help you find the right hat to suit your face shape.
Most faces can be broken down into nine basic shapes:
Oval: Longer than wide, and with a jaw that is narrower than the cheekbones. Ovals it seems are small than average on all measurements
Square: A wide jaw and hairline. The forehead and chin lengths are almost equal
Round: This face shape is identified by fullness below the cheekbones and a wide hairline.
Heart: The classic ‘English Rose’ shape, characterised by a wider forehead and narrow chin.
Oblong: Similar to the Oval shape, but with a much narrower bone structure.
Kite (Diamond): Kite face narrows at the jawline and chin with prominent cheekbones which are a little wider than mid and lower forehead
Rectangle: A defined jawline, of similar width to the lower forehead and cheekbone
teardrop: This is the only group for which the forehead length is shorter than the chin. A shorter face, with a narrow forehead and cheekbone
Heptagon: Striking features are a wide forehead and prominent cheekbones. Typically longer than average faces
Working out your face shape is relatively simple. We’ve found it best to use a flexible measuring tool, like a flexible tape measure, over a ruler. There are four areas that it helps to measure, to get a good idea of the shape of your face; The width of the forehead, cheekbones, jawline, and the length of the face from forehead to chin. Now note whichever is largest number and read the section below.
Oval Face Shape
If you have an oval face shape, it means that your face length is typically longer than the width of the cheekbones, and your face is likely to narrow at the jawline.
Is this you? Then you’re lucky. Because of your accentuated angles, softer jaw and longer shaped face, you are able to pick pretty much anything as most hats will suit your versatile features.
From our WELAN range, we can particularly recommend the Tiree Chunky Bobble and the Tiree Bobble Beanie. With their attractive bright colours, soft wool and fun design, they are perfect for any autumn or winter retreat in the cool Scottish Air.
Round Face Shape
Round faces tend to have measurements close together, so the length of your face is almost the same as the width across your cheekbones with the forehead and jawline measurements generally being shorter.
For rounder face shapes, we would recommend a beanie, pulled low over the forehead. This will elongate the face, and perfectly suit the soft angle of the jaw.
Our WELAN Tiree Special beanies, and Tiree Reversible (regular) beanies are best suited to this. Their delicate curves (and even softer wool) will create the illusion of length, sharpening the features of the face and accentuating the cheekbones. These tighter, straight edged hats are exactly what you need for a cool summer’s afternoon; attractive, flattering for round faces, and don’t forget wool is completely sustainable!
Longer Face Shapes
If you have a long face shape, that means your face is noticeable longer than it is wide. Typically, the forehead is the widest part of the face, and your cheekbones and chin will be equal in width.
Having a longer face shape means you are going to be best suited to hats that cut across your forehead. These will shorten the face, and in turn accentuate your bone structure. The trick is to pick looks that will create the illusion of width, such as fisherman’s caps or tighter woolly hats.
It is probably best to avoid slouches. Whilst we believe that, with confidence, anyone can pull off any one of our hats, a slouch is more likely to hang over the back of your head – towards the hairline. Wearing a hat high up on the forehead is more likely to highlight and elongate the face. A fisherman’s cap, in comparison, is a tight fit that cuts low just above the eyebrows.
For this, we would recommend a fisherman beanie, as a comfortable and cosy answer for a chilly day. With a ribbed edge, that sits low across the forehead, it is a practical and attractive choice for anyone looking for the perfect hat.
Heart Shaped Faces
Considered the classic “English Rose” look, if you have a heart shaped face then you are likely to have a forehead greater in width than the cheekbones and jawline, with a delicately pointed chin. It is exactly how it sounds, quite distinctly the shape of a heart.
Similar to a round face shape, a beanie pulled low over the forehead (With a straight brim) will be perfect to compliment this iconic style. This is because a straight brim, or angle, will de-accentuate the narrowness of the jaw, and will not over-exaggerate the facial features. Our Tiree beanies are perfect for this.
Square Face Shape
Square face shapes have the benefit of sharp facial features, with a strong bone structure. All measurements are usually similar, but the jawline is more angular than rounded – which sets this face shape aside a little more. In our experience, strong and straight lines in hats can sometimes over-exaggerate these features.
We would recommend something floppy, such as a slouchy beanie, as this will soften any strong, angular features. Our slouchy, reversible beanie is a perfect example and is available in a wide variety of colours.
Kite (Diamond) Face Shape
A Kite face shape can be determined by a face length that measures the largest over all other features. Then in descending order, it tends to be cheekbones, the forehead, and the jawline.
Interestingly, for people with a kite shaped face, how you wear the hat can be as important as the hat itself. Because of the narrowed chin, and forehead, a cosy pull-on you can style further back will mitigate any potential face-shortening.
In this case, similar to a square face, we would highly recommend a slouchy beanie – which can be stylised in whichever way you would like. A large bobble, that can be dropped back over the forehead, will keep you cosy and warm on winters days and be very flattering and fashionable.
Ultimately, the decision on which hat you would like (and will cherish) lies solely at your feet. Rather than an exact science, this guide is simply a way of gaining a better understanding of the differences facial shapes make to finding that perfect hat. Within each face shape category, there are so many variations that could be considered – from skin tone, and hair colour, to levels of confidence and fashion style. We wrote about hat styles here recently. The most important thing is picking a woolly beanie that you really love. And with so many choices, finding a hat to suit your face shape has never been easier!
Be super cosy on cold days! Choose the fun oversized super hand-knitted beanie with folded cuff. Made in a chunky knit with large Pom. Knitted in the round with circular needles, so there is no ugly side seam in the hat.
Wool is a lasting, sustainable and fully renewable material.
Available in three options:
WELAN Flock - very limited edition, made from the soft fleeces of our own special little Tiree flock of sheep who live happily with us forever, hand spun into yarn by us. You’ll receive an authenticity certificate with a lock of fleece, and a mounted photo of the sheep from which it came!
TIree Flock - made from soft fleeces sourced locally on Tiree, hand spun into yarn by us.
Scottish Wool - made from 100% Scottish ready made yarn, sourced as locally as possible
The process of making wool hats from scratch is quite lengthy: we wash the selected fleece, dry it, pick it and card it into “batts” to form fluffy clouds ready for spinning. After spinning two strands of single yarn, we ply them together to form the final yarn. The yarn is washed and dried, and then knitted into your hat. The hat is then washed once more to “set” the stitches. We carefully sew in the labels and send them to you them in our protective organic cotton bags. It’s a wonderfully slow and traditional way of making your hat, all done here by us on Tiree.
Material: 100% wool
One size - length 8'‘/20cm with the brim folded, can easily be adjusting by folding the brim more or less.
Contains lanolin, which makes the hat soft and water repellent - WELAN and Tiree wool only
Delivered to you in Organic cotton drawstring bag - natural dyes fade over time and in sunlight. We recommend using the bag to store your hat when not in use.
We make all hats to order to minimise waste, this is slow fashion at its best. If you’d like a different colour, or have a special request (e.g. baby size), please contact us and we will do our best to create something special for you.
Each hat is hand dyed and/or blended and colours will vary. Each hat is unique! Please allow for the colour to be slightly lighter or darker than the images shown here.
Sending as a gift? Send it direct by selecting a different delivery address at check-out and just let us know in the notes field if you’d like us to include a personal message. We’ll pop in a nice card and take care of the rest.