Covent Garden Hat Shop Open Until 8pm: Laird Hatters

Laird Hatters keeps late hours for a hat shop: its Covent Garden store at 23 & 23A New Row, London WC2N 4LA, opens Monday to Saturday from 10am to 8pm and Sunday and bank holidays from 11am to 7pm. It sells caps and hats made in its own Hertfordshire workshop, from a Shelby bakerboy at £115 to a Superfino Alfred Panama at £1,750, and staff will give a tired hat a light steam while you wait. That makes New Row the easiest place to buy a hat after work or before a West End show.

Laird was founded in 2009 by Alex and Zofia, who are still listed on the site as co-founders responsible for the brand's creative direction. The company describes its headwear as made by hand in Hertfordshire, at a workshop near Colliers End, and it now runs shops in London, Oxford and Cambridge. Its London branches are New Row, Jermyn Street, the Strand and Soho, and the Covent Garden shop stays open two hours later than the old hatters of St James's.

The shop's look comes from an accident of its first premises. That store had a stock of leftover copper piping, and rather than throw it out, the founders worked it into the brand. Copper now runs along the shelving in every Laird shop, and a small copper stud is hand-pressed onto every cap and some of the hats. Look for it on the side of a Shelby or a Brooklyn cap: it is how to tell a Laird piece at a glance.

The Our Story page sets out the process in nine steps. Fabric arrives at the Hertfordshire workshop and is matched to style and season. Panels are chalked and cut by hand rather than laser-cut, sewn on traditional machinery and pressed, then set on custom oak shaping blocks and steamed at a set temperature. Seamstresses tack the fabric tight to the brim, the copper stud goes on with a handheld press, and every piece is checked again before it is wrapped in tissue.

The cloth comes from mills and suppliers in Poland, Italy, France and Scotland as well as small British suppliers: tweed, loden, cashmere, wool, fur felt, cotton, linen, leather and toquilla straw for the Panamas. If you want something that is not on the shelf, Laird offers bespoke caps and says very little is off the table, from a particular cloth to a personal detail. The starting point is a conversation through its contact page.

Start with the caps, which are what the workshop does best. The Shelby Bakerboy is £115 and comes in tweeds such as salt and pepper. The Duckbill Cap in cotton is £105, and the Laird x Bart Kuykens Brooklyn Cap, a collaboration piece, is £145. All of them are cut from the same hand-chalked panels described above, so the difference between them is shape rather than quality.

For hats, The Bowler Hat is £125, which is a fair entry price for a proper bowler, and the Alfred Cashmere Suede Fedora is £265. The Panama wall runs from the Goodwood at £225 to the Superfino Alfred at £1,750. Skip the Superfino unless you have handled fine Panamas before: at that price the difference is in weave density you will only appreciate side by side, and a £225 Goodwood will do the same job on a London summer day.

The New Row shop offers a light hat steaming service while you wait, which is useful for a felt hat that has been crushed in a bag or caught in rain. For anything more involved, Laird's workshop handles repairs and customisation, and the listed repair service starts at £35 for jobs such as a new hat lining, a new ribbon or outer band, a new cap lining, peak or button, or cap panel patching. Requests currently go through a contact form, and each item is inspected before work begins.

Every page on the site advertises complimentary sizing advice, and the site publishes a size chart if you want to measure your head before you come in. If you sit between sizes in a cap, ask to try both on rather than relying on the label, since a tweed cap and a cotton duckbill can fit quite differently. UK delivery is free over £125 if you would rather not carry a hat box to the theatre.

The 8pm close is the reason to come here rather than to the St James's hatters, which shut at 5:30pm or 6pm. New Row is a narrow pedestrian lane linking St Martin's Lane with Covent Garden, so it fills with theatre-goers before evening curtains. Come between 4pm and 6pm on a weekday to have the shop to yourself before the pre-theatre rush, or right at 11am on a Sunday.

If the size you want is out, Laird's second London shop is on Jermyn Street in St James's, about fifteen minutes' walk away. Ask the New Row staff to ring their colleagues there before you cross town, so you only make the trip for a hat that fits.

Turn left out of the shop and you reach St Martin's Lane, home of the London Coliseum, where English National Opera performs. Across the road, Goodwin's Court is a narrow gaslit alley of bow-fronted Georgian doorways, and Cecil Court just beyond is lined with antiquarian booksellers and print dealers. Head the other way and New Row brings you into Covent Garden Piazza in a couple of minutes.

Seven Dials, where seven streets meet at a sundial pillar, is a short walk north and has plenty of cafés for a coffee while you decide between two caps. Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery are ten minutes south if you want to make an afternoon of it.

Address: Laird Hatters Covent Garden, 23 & 23A New Row, London WC2N 4LA. Hours: Monday to Friday 10am to 8pm, Saturday 10am to 8pm, Sunday and bank holidays 11am to 7pm. Phone: +44 20 7240 4240. Repairs and customisation: admin@lairdhatters.com. Leicester Square and Covent Garden Underground stations are each a few minutes' walk away.

Prices from the Laird online shop include VAT: Duckbill Cap £105, Shelby Bakerboy £115, The Bowler Hat £125, Alfred Cashmere Suede Fedora £265, Goodwood Panama £225 and repair service from £35. Ask the Karpo APP for a pre-theatre dinner near Covent Garden after you have chosen your cap.