On Wednesday, Ellen DeGeneres lightly poked fun at Aretha Franklin’s unusual inauguration hat. The gray felt cap with the giant bow got a lot of people talking, with more against than for it. I knew it was a serious topic of conversation when I noticed last night that my roommate had joined a Facebook group devoted to the hat. That’s how you know stuff is important. Ellen’s take on it was pretty cute.

On Wednesday’s Ellen DeGeneres Show, the talk show host sports an over-the-top hat similar to the one that Aretha Franklin wore to Barack Obama’s historic inauguration.

“That would of been so embarrassing. The next thing you know, we would have been in Us Weekly’s ‘Who Wore it Better?'” DeGeneres jokes. “They said this is the only one they made! I can’t believe it!”

[From Us Weekly]

US notes that bloggers took to the web en masse to protest Franklin’s hat.

On Tuesday, bloggers criticized Franklin… “What was up with Aretha Franklin’s hat at the inauguration? While it’s quite Aretha-like, between the shape and the bow and the glitter she reminded me of the ball atop Times Square on New Year’s Eve. Tone it down, honey, this is not your day,” wrote blogger Kristi Gustafson on Timesunion.com.

[From Us Weekly]

To be fair, it’s Aretha’s job to be “Aretha-like,” regardless of the occasion. It’s also “Aretha-like” to wear unsupportive dresses without a bra, but she at least kept that business to herself. And a couple hundred people are big fans of the hat. The milliner who made it has been flooded with requests, and is doing his best to accommodate eager buyers.

The calls began to flood Luke Song’s hat shop not long after Aretha Franklin finished belting out “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee” at President Barack Obama’s inauguration. Franklin, who wore a gray felt custom-designed hat from Mr. Song Millinery, has inadvertently caused an economic boom for the South Korean immigrant’s store.

Song said he wasn’t prepared for the hundreds of calls requesting the hat with a Swarovski rhinestone-bordered bow. We even have a lot of men calling to get it for their wives, mothers and grandmothers,” Song said. The hat worn by the “Queen of Soul” was hand-molded and would cost upward of $500 _ if it were for sale, the 36-year-old designer said. Customers instead were offered a satin ribbon version for $179.

“They want the same hat, but they understand it’s for the ‘Queen’ only,” he said. “Ninety-nine percent said, ‘That’s fine. I’ll get the next best thing.'” The family millinery has been in Detroit for about 25 years, and Franklin has been a customer for about 20 of those years. The store also sells to about 500 boutiques across the country. “We always make hats for her for high-profile events, so for us, the inauguration really was no big deal,” Song told The Associated Press on Thursday.

[From the Huffington Post]

I love that making a hat for a historic inauguration was no big deal to them. I suppose if it were an ordinary hat it would make sense for them not to think twice about it. But that was one attention-grabbing piece of headwear. In a sense, Aretha designed it herself. According to Song, it was a combination of two different hats. Franklin walked through the store looking at the merchandise and said, “I want that bow (put) on that hat.” Sounds like it worked out well for nearly everyone – with the exception of a vocal few.

Images thanks to Newscom.