The queens of the queen of pop and fashion crazes are decorated with a knitted hat by a Finnish designer.
Stella Pictures, All Over Press
Madonna has been a pioneer in both music and fashion for decades. Now the head of the uncrowned queen of pop, recognized by all, is decorated by a Finnish, originally a swan. Taavi Mäkelän designed knitted headgear. “Madde” has shared a series of eight images on his Instagram account, three of which feature Mäkelä’s work.
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The collaboration started on Instagram
The collaboration between Mäkelä and Madonna has its roots in the actress model To Evan Mock, which is familiar to many from HBO’s remake of the Gossip Girl series. Mock is a passionate skater, and Mäkeläk is also recognized as such.
– Mock found me on Instagram and we made a deal out of a few hats. Through it, I met Ricardo Gomes, who is Madonna’s personal photographer. We started speculating what kind of hat could be designed for Madonna, Mäkelä says.
Mock has presented Mäkelä’s balaclava-style ski hats to his millionaires in the story section of Instagram. It was decided to use the same colors for Madonna’s headdress. A fair-sized fishing hat was chosen as the model, bucket hat.
The hat is made of fluffy yarn, which makes the hat soft. The cylinder, on the other hand, is harder because it is made of cotton yarn.
Grandma taught to crochet
Seeing your own hat with a queen of pop is, of course, a big deal for Mäkelä’s career. When he woke up in the morning, he marveled at the beeping phone when many wanted to reach out to textile designer Madonna after the Instagram photo.
– It feels like this is a bigger thing for others than for themselves. Although, of course, it’s nice that people use my works. Madonna brings a lot of visibility, Mäkelä says.
The beanie made by Mäkelä was first seen by a public figure, a journalist-presenter Maria Veitola, less than two years ago. Since then, balaclava helmets in particular have been seen by Finnish rappers and other artists, for example. Mäkelä calls them the milestones of his own career.
All the hats made by Mäkelä are unique. She has been crocheting about 200 hats in the last couple of years. She was enthusiastic about crocheting from primary school onwards in textile classes and honed her skills in the teachings of her own grandmother, a craftsman herself.
– Grandma taught different techniques and advised how to make a hat better, Mäkelä says.
Snowboarding and skating have always been Mäkelä’s hobbies. The boom of homemade beanies hit him when he was in middle school, so he also crocheted hats for his friends. At the age of 13, he won a nationwide beanie competition.
Mäkelä was fascinated by textiles and graduated from Metropolia as a textile designer. The crochet was gone for a long time, but Mäkelä got excited about it again towards the end of his studies in 2019. Before his own brand, he has done internships with the Finnish Mannisto and En Hats signs, for example.