Ecua-Andino Hats Ecua-Andino Hats Ecua-Andino Hats is an Ecuadorian company founded in 1985 by Alejandro Lecaro and Édgar Sánchez. The brand is dedicated to the production and exportation of Panama hats. It is one of the most important companies producing finished Panama hats in Ecuador. In 1985, Édgar Sánchez and Alejandro Lecaro started to sell local crafts, initially to tourists on the beach, and then from a small shop in the center of Guayaquil, Ecuador. In 1994, they decided to change the product range and concentrated on hats only. In 2012, UNESCO declared that the art of weaving a Panama hat in
Hats (album) chart in early 1990, becoming the group's only single chart entry in that country. In November 2012 Virgin Records released two-CD "Collector's Edition" versions of "Hats" and its predecessor "A Walk Across the Rooftops" in the UK and Europe, each containing a remastered version of the original album plus a second CD of bonus tracks. The remastering process was overseen by original engineer Calum Malcolm, along with contributions by Paul Buchanan and Robert Bell, who chose the songs for the bonus CD. On its initial release in 1989, "Hats" received highly positive reviews from music critics. Describing the album as