Panama hat more hats than they ever could in Ecuador. The hats were sold to gold prospectors traveling through Panama to California during the historic Californian Gold Rush. Travelers would tell people admiring their hats that they bought them in Panama. So, the hats quickly became known as “Panama hats.” Soon after at the 1855 World's Fair in Paris, Panama hats were featured for the first time on a global scale. However, the Fair’s catalog did not mention Ecuador as its country of origin. It listed this type of hat as a “cloth hat” even though it was clearly not made out
Panama hat turn of the 20th century, these hats became popular as tropical and seaside accessories owing to their ease of wear and breathability. The art of weaving the traditional Ecuadorian toquilla hat was added to the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Lists on 5 December 2012. Panama hat is an Intangible Cultural Heritage, a term used to define practices, traditions, knowledge, and skills communities passed down from generation to generation as part of their cultural heritage. Beginning in the early to mid-1600s, hat weaving evolved as a cottage industry along the Ecuadorian coast as well as in small towns throughout the Andean