Issey Miyake’s TYPE-O baseball cap is also a flat cap. Not like a Peaky Blinders-style tweed hat, but a flat cap in the most literal sense of the word.

The Japanese label’s A-POC ABLE line — tasked with expanding Issey Miyake’s “a piece of cloth” concept, where a single fabric produces an entire garment — created a baseball cap using "Steam Stretch" technology. This includes weaving heat-sensitive thread into a flat garment and then steaming it, causing it to shrink and form pleats along the jacquard weave. 

It’s a crazy process to observe. What was once a flat piece of fabric suddenly comes alive as three-dimensional folds pop out from the surface, almost like how popcorn expands in the microwave. The resulting material is known as "TYPE-O," and it features on the top of this baseball cap.

The zig-zag-patterned TYPE-O fabric sits flat when not worn, flush with the cap’s brim, but expands to fit its wearer’s head. Combined with the drawstring at the back, it creates a cap that adapts to its wearer. While undeniably innovative, it is also classic Issey Miyake.

This is a brand famous for its revolutionary pleating technique, derived from feeding polyester into a heat press to create permanent folds, and for its experimental work with  with 3D-printing clothes as early as 1998 — a production method the industry is still catching up with.

Making a shape-shifting baseball cap with geometric pleats created through heat-sensitive threads? That's Issey Miyake being Issey Miyake. 

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