In the Chilean village of Rari, the art of molding crin de caballo, or horsehair, into beautiful objects has been passed down for generations. Today, artisans there still turn the coarse fibers into shapes such as angels, dolls, flowers and more.
Their most recent handiwork — the flowers on 50 women’s hats, inspired by the frothy fascinators worn at social events and particularly horse races such as Royal Ascot in England — traveled almost 9,000 miles this month to be worn during the first exhibition polo matches ever held in Qatar.
The matches, from Dec. 11 to 13, were the closing event of the 2025 Qatar Years of Culture, an annual celebration involving Qatar and other countries. This year the focus was on Argentina and Chile, and most of the hats were sold at a Years of Culture booth created to look like the Rari workshops. Others were given to winners of outdoor games during the event.
The idea to incorporate creations from Chile came from Maha Al Shebani, who works in programming for Qatar Years of Culture. Born in the emirate, she has visited Britain dozens of times and been struck by the craftsmanship of the crin-accented hats seen at some of its horse races.
“I wanted to add something new to the way audiences experience it since we are just getting to know polo here in Qatar,” she said. “Wearing crin hats while watching a polo match is a way for local Qatari women to celebrate history and begin new traditions on opposite sides of the world.”
Mrs. Al Shebani enlisted the help of María Francisca Alarcón, a designer and the founder of Perla de Novia, a jewelry and accessories business in Santiago, Chile, to design a hat in several colors, most notably the maroon of the Qatari flag. The women agreed on something festive and adaptable — a design that could even accent a hijab, the head scarf worn by many Muslim women.
“I wanted María Francisca to honor the roots of her country, but we wanted to honor the idea of modesty in Qatari culture,” Mrs. Al Shebani explained. “Her idea of adding a few flowers to each hat was perfect.”
The hats were given to attendees at the polo matches, courtesy of the Qatar Years of Culture initiative.
As for Ms. Alarcón, who was born in Rari and lives in Santiago, it was her first foray into sewing fascinator-style hats. Each one, an oval about 7 inches by 9 inches, was made of cotton and linen with some small linen bows and a tuft of faux feathers, but crin flowers from Rari were the centerpieces. Her experience designing elaborate bridal headpieces, called tocados, came in handy.
“I’ve started making tocados, which is a form of craftsmanship all its own and can be headbands placed in various ways,” Ms. Alarcón, 35, said through a translator in a video interview. “This kind of hat shows a lot of elegance, femininity and great sophistication, and I wanted to design a hat that transmits elegance but is not invasive.”
Crin craftsmanship in Chile, and specifically in Rari and nearby villages, became a local industry in the late 19th century when natural hot springs in the area started to attract wealthy Chilean tourists, and locals began making souvenirs such as jewelry and baskets.
“My family has been doing this for over 120 years, and my grandmother founded the first association of artisans in Rari, so I grew up with this tradition,” Emerson Basoalto Toro, a craftsman in Rari and a member of the Artesania Chilenas, a consortium of local crin artisans, said through a translator in a video interview. “This process hasn’t changed in 200 years. Everything is done by hand, so there are no tools. The process is quite simple.”
It all begins with hair from a horse’s tail. “The horse uses its tail to repel insects, but when the hair is too long, it hinders the movement a bit, so the tail is always being trimmed,” said Mr. Toro, 50. “It’s basically a haircut.”
Once the trimmings are combed, the hair is submerged briefly in a dye called ixtle, made from agave and yucca plants in various colors and imported from Mexico, to strengthen the strands. It then is rinsed with salt to set the color and left to dry in the sun.
When artisans begin to make shapes, they layer some strands of hair on top of other strands, much like braiding or freehand weaving. Initially they create circles, then work from the centers outward, overlapping the horsehair vertically and horizontally.
It’s all in the fingers, Mr. Toro said. “A certain degree of tension and pressure must be applied to keep the weave firm and to mold the desired shape,” he explained. “We use our fingertips over and over, and this can take hours.”
Mr. Toro and five fellow artisans created a total of 150 flowers, each one 8 centimeters (slightly more than 3 inches) in diameter. The flowers were shipped every couple of weeks to Santiago, where Ms. Alarcón added four to each hat before sending them off to to Qatar in early December, in time for the polo matches.
“I wanted it to be easy for the women who are going to wear it, more as an accompaniment than something that would stick out,” Ms. Alarcón said. “And crin comes from the equestrian world, so that connection to polo and the horses was very important to me.”
The post Flowers of Horsehair, a Chilean Specialty, Travel to Qatar appeared first on New York Times.
