On a small side street in North Macedonia’s biggest Turkish bazaar lives the last hat maker of Skopje.
I had heard whispers about Ilco Trajkovski’s work and had become determined to track him down, eventually finding him leant against a tall, cream building with a cigarette dangling from his mouth.
The yellow canary in a cage above the door cried as Ilco gave me a sharp look and asked what I wanted.
‘I want to talk to you,’ I said.
He threw away his cigarette and led me into the small, shambolic hat shop. Inside, the space was filled with memories from the life of him, his father, and his grandfather. He moaned as he sat down, rubbing a buckled knee with a hand hardened from a lifetime of work. On his middle finger was a signet ring with the face of Jesus.
70 years ago, Ilco ran a small hat store in the USSR — and now he worked in the exact same location except in a country under a different name.
‘I’m the last hatter of Skopje,’ he announced as I sat down opposite him. ‘I started making hats at the age of six under the instruction of my grandfather. The people here worshipped him.’
Ilco gestured to the many news articles plastered around the walls, showcasing the work of the men that had come before him. Apparently, his father had been known for his ‘hands of gold.’
‘My family has always been based here. Before, this area was small, but the city has grown around us. Now, this bazaar is a place that the tourists visit — before, it was a sanctuary for the outcasts.’
Over the course of the next few weeks, I would visit Ilco several times. Slowly, he stopped greeting me with a scowl, instead welcoming me with a cup of strong, black, Turkish tea. He started to divulge his life story one cup at a time.
‘The hat business is dying out,’ he told me. ‘People just don’t care as much anymore for beauty, for love, or for hard work. My son works abroad — our family business will die with me.’
‘Has it been a good business?’ I asked.
‘The best,’ he replied, fleshy lips pressing together in a tight smile. ‘This shop gave me the best life. I couldn’t have wished for more.’
Ilco asked if I would like to learn about the process of hat-making. Of course, I agreed.
‘Women never make hats,’ he told me, ‘as it is a strictly man’s business. My wife has never even touched this machine. But if you’re interested, I can teach you.’
And so he did. Each time I visited him, he would tell me a little more about the process. I touched the machine, I felt the fabrics — and in turn, the world of hat-making seemingly opened up in front of me.
‘First, you need the right material,’ he explained. ‘I start with straw, which I bleach for a week. Then I cut it and shape it, and the hardest part is weaving it. Whilst the acid is dipped, I spend a very long time weaving. Then, sometimes I cover it. I prefer to work with linen or felt. Sometimes I use rice starch — it has a nice touch.’
His wooden bracelet made a scraping sound against the machine as he worked.
‘Then, the hat is ready to be sold. When it is custom made, I know the size just by looking at your head. I never need to measure — a good hat maker never does.’
He taught me the whole process and I wrote precise notes on each element. Then one day, he told me that there were four secret things a person needed to do whilst making a hat.
‘What are they?’
‘I can’t tell you. They’re secret.’
Sometimes, Ilco seemed giddy, untethered. His stories seemed to float between memories, people, decades. Every now and then, he seemed to drop out of the conversation and lose himself to somewhere else completely.
‘I can speak twelve languages,’ he told me one day. ‘I worked as a surgeon in Australia, I have four degrees in nuclear science. Technically, I have an American visa, but I decided to stay here, in Skopje. The people here need me. They need my hats.’
‘How many people still buy your hats?’
‘Oh, enough. But now it’s mainly just tourists who buy from me. When my father worked here, he barely sold a single hat to a tourist. Now, my hats are worn in Italy and Holland.’
On the last day I saw him, Ilco finally asked what my job was.
‘I’m a travel writer,’ I said.
He frowned. ‘Well, you should go to the countryside or the small towns. You won’t find anything interesting to write about here.’
And with that, he adjusted his glasses and went back to sewing a small brown hat, knowing exactly what size to make it without measuring, his fingers sewing the fabric almost without even looking.
‘Hat fashion never changes,’ he said, as I put down my empty cup of tea. ‘I hope that my son changes his mind. He would be a beautiful hatter.’
