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Mita Pasqualle is the owner of Pompadour, a Ferndale store specializing in high-end hats and other accessories.Local spotlight
Ferndale store offers high-scale headwear
Pompadour opened in 2004, selling hats, accessories and purses to satisfy a rising demand.
Pompadour has up to 200 hats to choose from.
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FERNDALE -- Rod Keenan's hats have graced the heads of Elvis Costello, Brad Pitt, Justin Timberlake and Samuel Jackson. They are sold in New York, Beverly Hills, Calif., London, Tokyo, Toronto, Hong Kong, and Ferndale at Pompadour, run by Mita Pasqualle.
"Mita contacted us several seasons ago expressing interest in the collection," said Keenan, who works from his millinery studio in Harlem. "We wondered if the market in Michigan could support our price point: It has. Mita has lots of experience in headwear, and she understands our vision."
Men's hats make up only a small portion of Pompadour's stock, which also features women's hats from Eugenia Kim, Cha-Cha's House of Ill Repute and other designers, mostly from New York.
"I was disappointed with the selection of hats in this area," Pasqualle said. "There are fine places for men, but not women." So with more than 10 years of retail experience with her husband running the Magic Bus store in Dearborn, Pasqualle decided to take the plunge and open a hat store.
"I've been wanting to do finer hats for years, but our other store in Dearborn caters to people 18 to 30," she said, noting that the younger crowd prefers less expensive hats, like those from Kangol at prices around $50. Pompadour attracts people 25 and older who want a hat to go clubbing or to go to church, including those willing to spend more than $300, she said.
With up to 200 hats to choose from, Pasqualle wants to provide a greater selection than department stores. "It's not like the old days when people wore hats all the time," she said. "But hats are coming back, more so now than a few years ago."
Diane Feen, editor of Hat Life, an industry publisher of information about headwear, said more and more young people are trading baseball caps for fedoras and dressier felt and straw hats. "Headwear seems to be woven even tighter in the fabric of young people today," Feed said.
Pasqualle and Feen credit the resurgence in headwear to celebrities donning hats.
"Much of this flurry of activity in headwear sales is due to hip-hop and rap artists wearing hats in their music videos and in their movies," Feen said. "They want the glamour look that the rich stars are wearing, and the stars are wearing hats and caps."
Pasqualle opened Pompadour in spring 2004 and said business has been growing. Her store sits just south of the main business section of Ferndale.
"I'm not on Nine Mile, so it's sort of a destination store," she said. "At this point, I'm getting more traffic and word of mouth." Pompadour also sells accessories, sunglasses, jewelry and handbags.
"I would love to do more accessories, more purses and I love jewelry," Pasqualle said.
Neal Haldane is a Metro Detroit freelance writer.
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The Detroit News.
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