How baseball caps are made

A fitted baseball cap is sewn from six triangles of cloth meeting at a button on top.

stations: 6
things upstream: 46
raw sources: 12
steps from the ground: 8

The short version

A baseball cap is cut from fabric into six panels plus a bill. The front panels are stiffened and often embroidered while still flat. Sewers join the panels into a rounded crown, add eyelets, a sweatband and the bill, and top the crown with a fabric-covered button. A final steam press shapes the finished cap.

Cut the panels

Fabric is cut into six pie-shaped crown panels. The material is cotton, wool or, in major league caps since 2007, polyester.

Goes in
Cotton fabric
Embroider the logo

While the front panels are still flat, an embroidery machine stitches the logo into them.

Goes in
Sewing thread
Stiffen the front

The front panels are lined with a stiff fabric called buckram so the logo stands upright and the crown holds its shape.

Goes in
Adhesive
Sew the crown together

The six sections are stitched into a rounded crown. Metal grommets or fabric eyelets are set in near the top to let air in.

Goes in
Sewing thread
Attach the bill

A curved bill covered in matching fabric is sewn to the front. It was designed to shade a player's eyes from the sun.

Goes in
Polypropylene
Top with a button and steam

A button, called a squatchee, covers the point where the panels meet. An adjustable strap goes in the back, then the cap is steam pressed into shape.

Goes in
Button

End of the lineBaseball cap

Worth repeating

The Brooklyn Excelsiors wore the ancestor of the modern baseball cap in 1860, with a long peak and a button on top.
Latex rubber became the stiffening material inside the hat in the 1940s, and the modern baseball cap was born.
Major League Baseball changed its players' standard cap from wool to polyester in 2007.