Just before Christmas 2019 I lost my hat that served me well for several years. I started to use my buff, but it is good for hikes and not for my job, at my age ;-). So, during one of long hikes I made myself a hard to time to figure out, how to make a hat with following properties

• nicely elastic as a whole
• double layer over the ears
• made from colours to use leftovers

When I was little, my grandmother made me a hat in garter stitch knitted sideways and with a quasi “pom-pom” by simple yarn fastening at one side. I loved that hat. So, I decided to make something similar but more adapted to my adult needs. The garter stitch perpendicular to usual direction of a hat would provide elasticity. However, as I wanted many colours, everybody knows that changing colours looks nice at the right side but not as much at the wrong one. As I wanted a double layer brim over the ears, the changeable colours garter stitch requires that the right and wrong sides flip at the fold. How to make it?
The knitting (knits) starts from the fold, goes to the top of the hat, after turn around it goes back to the fold and continues to the brim, where the turnaround is accompanied by a distitch selvedge. The knitting continues to the fold. The last two stitches before the fold are purled, as is the first stitch of the next ridge after the fold. All other stitches, except those three purls in both rows forming one ridge, are knits. The colour of the yarn can be changed between the 2nd and the 3rd purl, if desired. Any knots remain hidden in the inner side of the folded brim. The line formed by three purls forces the brim to fold correctly. However, if a longer hat is wanted for whatever purpose the fold for the brim could be made lower, down to the middle of the brim. After that, wrong side of the brim starts to show and the hat is not as nice as it should be.