You may have noticed, I have been making several millinery pieces of white straw lately. This is because with the pandemic induced straw shortage, I ordered a bunch of white straw since I couldn’t get my natural Milan straw.
Of course, this prompted me to look further into white straw. I knew I had read plenty about white straw hats and bonnets in the past. But, now, I wanted to take a closer look at the use of white straw and what it was commonly trimmed with.
The July 1861 edition of Peterson’s shows that white hats were worn by children, young women, and women with these descriptions of a “Child’s Hat”, a “Misses’ Hat”, and “The Caledonian Riding Hat”. I am, of course, intrigued by the “fancy straw button”, the “large black straw button,” and “straw ornaments.”
The month following shows this Caledonian hat with the white crown and black brim. (August 1861 Petersons) I will be coming back to this style hat in a near future post.
White straw was not exclusive to hats of course. Madame Demorest shares a few white bonnets with us in her M’me Demorest’s Quarterly Mirror of Fashions, 1863
The irony of the moment is that as I finish up writing this post I started last Monday, this Monday I am working with some pink straw. Go figure.
If I Had My Own Blue Box: 
All are very pretty.