Montappone, Italy | A Belfry Italia Partner
Our partnership with Complit allows us to explore a more expressive side of Belfry Italia. Founded in 1989 by five young entrepreneurs with deep connections to the hatmaking communities of Montappone and nearby Massa Fermana, Complit represents three generations of experience in the craft. What began with the traditional art of straw weaving has evolved into a remarkably creative Italian hat company known for pushing materials, shapes, colors, and embellishments in unexpected directions. When we want to create something that stands apart, Complit gives us an extraordinary place to start.
Our visits to Italy give us the opportunity to turn that creativity into styles developed specifically for Belfry. Rather than simply choosing from Complit's existing collection, we sit down together and design. We look through materials and color possibilities, discuss brim proportions and shapes, experiment with trims and embellishments, and consider how dramatic—or understated—a particular style should be. Sometimes we begin with one of Complit's ideas and refine it for our customer; other times, our own ideas and customer requests become the starting point. It's a collaborative process of editing, adjusting, and experimenting until the finished hat feels distinctly right for Belfry.
Our customers are especially important to this process because women's occasion hats require a careful balance. Women want a hat that gets noticed, but they also want to feel comfortable and confident wearing it. We hear which colors they're searching for, which brim sizes feel manageable, what they're wearing to weddings and the Kentucky Derby, and when they want something dramatic versus something more refined. We take that feedback with us to Montappone. Complit brings the imagination and technical ability to turn those ideas into a hat; we help direct that creativity through what we've learned from the women who will ultimately wear it. Their creativity. Our design direction. Your feedback.
Complit's remarkable range gives us plenty to work with. Their event hats and fascinators use lightweight materials such as sinamay and sisal that can be dyed and shaped into sculptural forms, making them ideal for weddings, race days, garden parties, and other special occasions. But their creativity doesn't stop with formal millinery. We also work with their more casual brims and distinctive embellished berets, where layered materials, unexpected textures, hand-painted finishes, rhinestones, and carefully placed details can transform a familiar silhouette into something completely different. With Complit, even a small detail can become the element that makes a hat memorable.
That's why Complit has become such an important part of our Belfry Italia Montappone Collection. They give us the craftsmanship and creative freedom to explore ideas that wouldn't be possible with every maker; we bring more than four decades of experience, our own design direction, and the feedback we receive directly from our customers. Together, we can take an idea from a conversation in Montappone to a finished hat that feels special, distinctive, and unmistakably Belfry. Not simply selected in Italy. Developed together. Crafted in Italy. Exclusive to Belfry.
