Bollenhut, Black Forest, Germany

A young woman in Gutach in the Black Forest poses in full traditional dress and Bollenhut around 1900, in an early color print. The Bollenhut is a whitewashed straw hat topped with wool pompoms, and strictly it belongs to just three Protestant villages: Gutach, Kirnbach and Reichenbach. Red pompoms mean the wearer is unmarried; married women wear black. It became the emblem of the whole Black Forest, and it still comes out for church festivals, weddings and local celebrations.