A Few Custom Hats We Can’t Stop Thinking About
At Rendered, we’re always down to make things we’d actually wear. That’s why custom hats are a studio favorite and our top pick for blending creativity and craftsmanship.
Turning classic headwear into custom-branded pieces for local and national companies is our jam. Whether we’re fleshing out a full merch line or transforming strong artwork into something that keeps the rain off your head, a graphic hat should feel personal and it should hold up.
That’s exactly why these projects stood out.
Temple Pastries “Butter” Hats
The Vibe: Seattle’s Temple Pastries is built around laminated dough and a real devotion to butter. Founder and James Beard nominee Christina Wood started the bakery as a croissant pop-up before opening her Central District bakery in 2020.
Temple Pastries' motto, “Believing in Butter,” along with its name, are nods to what they refer to as “the cult of the croissant.” And, it carries through everything they do, from precise, many-layered pastries to Wood’s 2025 cookbook Pastry Temple, where she teaches home bakers how to build a proper butter block from scratch.
Christina has released butter hats before in blue with yellow stitching, and they regularly sell out. This round was about refining the recipe.
The Details: Temple Pastries artwork landed on our favorite dad hat style, the Valucap VC300A, a low-profile, unstructured dad cap we reach for when we want a relaxed, worn-in feel. It’s also one of the more affordable blanks we carry, which makes it a smart fit for retail programs.
For embroidery, everything is handled in-house in our Portland studio. We run commercial-grade machines and keep the entire process under one roof, dialing in stitch paths and densities to the specific blank. Threads and techniques are chosen for performance, and every hat is cleaned, trimmed, and checked so it looks and feels right inside and out.
Why It Worked: The result is embroidery that holds its shape, wears well, and reflects disciplined craft.
The Valucap VC300A colorway Temple Pastries chose is literally called Butter, which feels almost too easy in the best way.
The soft yellow base paired with a bold blue thread did most of the heavy lifting, so the irreverent artwork sits naturally on the classic silhouette.
Plus, the price point makes sense for bakery retail, and the construction holds up to daily wear. It’s the kind of hat people grab on their way out the door, which is probably why they keep selling through. It doesn’t get much “butter” than this. A dad joke for a dad hat? The perfect fit.
Fathers + Fairways Two-Tone Color Match Hats
The Ask: We spend a lot of time thinking about hats. Shape, weight, structure, and how they break in. The best decoration methods for the artwork. We could go on.
Joel Loncka of Fathers + Fairways reached out from Denver with a rush order on our website. Once the mockups came through, we made a few small design tweaks together and got everything dialed. Files checked, inks matched, production lined up. We hit his in-hands date without issue.
The direction was simple: keep the silhouette classic, the fine line detail precise, and color-match the ink to the bill.
The Process: We built these on the AS Colour Class Two-Tone Cap 1154.
The AS Colour 1154 is a lightweight, mid-profile five-panel cap made from 100% cotton. It features a contrast dome, flat peak, tonal eyelets for ventilation, and a plastic snapback closure. One size fits all with a tear-out label for a clean finish.
We reach for AS Colour because the construction is consistent and the shapes feel retro and modern at the same time. Solid structure, subtle branding, premium materials: Just the way we like it.
We Pantone-matched the bill first, then printed the artwork in that exact same tone so the brim and the graphic lined up visually. The fine line detail was where our team’s experience really showed. Clean registration. Crisp edges. No blur. Just sharp ink that holds up over time.
Why We Loved It: This one worked because it felt cohesive.
Because we’re officially licensed with PANTONE™, every screen printing order includes complimentary color matching. This time, it pulled the whole piece together.
The two-tone structure adds depth and the silhouette is timeless. The hats felt considered and easy to throw on round after round.
Scout Motors Logo Hats
Scout Motors is bringing back a heritage vehicle name with completely modern engineering. Classic DNA, clean-sheet design. “Built for people who give a damn,” but powered by new tech and a forward-looking mindset.
They’re honoring the past by reimagining it.
Scout Motors need a rush order for an activation and the hats needed to feel sharp, confident, and aligned with who they are.
The Solution: We ran these on the AS Colour Surf Cap 1114.
The 1114 Surf Cap is a mid-profile, unstructured snapback made from lightweight, quick-dry 100 percent recycled nylon.
There’s something fitting about pairing Scout Motors with a surf silhouette. The original Scout vehicles were hauling boards and gear back in the 60s. Utility rigs built for people who were outside, moving, exploring. The Surf Cap carries that same lineage.
The print itself was simple, clean and needed to match the Scout branding. We moved quickly, kept communication tight, and delivered on time for the activation.
Why It's a Favorite: This one worked for two reasons.
A tight timeline didn’t change the process. Files were reviewed, colors confirmed, and production stayed organized.
The alignment was also clear.
Scout is blending legacy and innovation. The AS Colour 1114 does the same. A classic surf profile rebuilt with recycled nylon and updated construction.
The result was a hat that feels light, functional, and ready to wear behind the wheel.
Thinking about custom hats for your brand?
If you’re building a merch line, outfitting a crew, or planning an activation, custom hats are a strong starting point.
At Rendered, the approach is consistent. We select the right blank, align decoration and color with intent, refine artwork for clean execution, and keep production controlled from sample to final run. The scale changes, but the fundamentals do not.
