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Hip Hats
A Creative Discovery of Hope
By Gwen Morrison
Christine Heinen from Tampa, Fla., began a career in design in 1989. She worked as a creative director for a company that made fantasy retail displays out of Styrofoam. "It was my dream job, but I didn't have my dream boss," she says. "I wanted my own thing. I knew that starting a business would be tough, but it seemed the only way I would ever have stability in a creative field."
Heinen decided to design hats. She quit her day job and moved into a cheap artist's apartment on the shadier side of town and got to work on her plans. Lacking the business training that she felt she needed to make her company a success, she put herself on a steady diet of business books. Soon, the paint-chipped walls of her new apartment were covered with all sorts of wild and funky hats.
While chatting one day with a friend, Heinen discovered her niche. Heinen's friend was recalling the time when she used to wear a lot of hats after her chemotherapy treatments. The friend had lost her hair and told Heinen that she found wigs too hot and itchy; she wore all sorts of hats instead. Then the friend told her that she had wished for a hat with hair. Heinen knew she had to change gears.
"It was like a giant neon sign hit me over the head and read: Create and sell the most comfortable and hip looking hats with hair!" she says.
Heinen set to work right away, experimenting with putting hair in her own hats. To get the inside scoop on what women with cancer wanted, she volunteered to work at Moffit Cancer Center. It was there that Heinen got just the break she needed. The Childhood Leukemia Foundation (CLF) of Brick New Jersey just happened to call one day while Heinen was working, asking if anyone knew who was making hats with hair for children.