“Generally, cowboy hats in the past were made of rabbit or beaver and — since it is made from animal hides — the hat will take on your sweat. It creates a permanent mark that you can’t get out and so hat bands were created in order to hide those stains,” explains Haley Fitzgerald, the owner, founder and creative mind behind Spruced Plume, an animal-to-hat accessories company. Haley’s products are sourced from her own hunted game, accessorizing the ranchers holding onto the old ways, the modern-day cowhand or just your average Jackson citizen. “The idea then was that you could work cattle all day, and then go out to a bar to go dancing at night and wear the same hat.”

Haley hunts as a way of existing as sustainably as possible in this modern world and uses it as a way to support her creative endeavors as well.

“Hunting is something that I’m really passionate about because I hunt to eat. I found that, although I was consuming the meat, I wasn’t using any of the feathers of my birds and I’ve always cared a lot about whole-animal use,” Haley explains, describing the thought processes that led her to begin crafting hat accessories. Her product has since evolved from simple pin-back plumes to elaborate hat bands, magnetic accessories, pocket squares and bow ties. She has also begun incorporating leather from some of the big game that she hunts, ensuring that no part of her animals go to waste.

Between the creative energy that she harnesses to design her products and her time spent in nature, Haley finds herself content and rejuvenated. “It’s my truest love, just being able to get out and work with my dogs and be outside,” she says. “It’s my version of mental health, being out deep in the backcountry. Then, on the back end, being able to transform those feathers into something unique and really beautiful is an amazing artistic outlet for me.”